After twelve year-old Sunny makes it successfully through a
heart transplant, she’s determined to change her life. In the days leading up to her surgery, she
was always so sick. Worst of all, her BFF Margot betrayed her. She’s determined to do new things, key among
them is to find a boy and kiss him.
But life is so much more complicated. Her mother (who abandoned her eight years
ago) has returned and wants to be part of her life. At first, Sunny is resistant and suspicious and has to be urged on by her guardian Kate. But when mother and daughter bond, the new relationship put a stress on Sunny and Kate's own one, particularly as Kate finds herself protecting Sunny from some of her Mom's darker secrets.
More important is Sunny's new friend Quinn, who is helping her in the Boy Quest. The girls are not terribly successful, at least in part because Sunny finds herself thinking
that she’d rather be kissing Quinn instead. Does that mean she's a lesbian?
With so many traumas going on, the novel runs the risk of
being cluttered, but Blake does a good job of keeping things moving
along. It helps that the many different stories eventually interweave making the complexity organic and less distracting. Delightfully, Sunny’s forays into exploring her gender identity are sensitively handled. The overall result is a beautiful story full of honest emotion, and respectful to both adults and children.
Highly recommended.
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