What the Moon Saw, by Laura Resau

Clara has developed a restlessness at home. She feels distant from her friends and she finds herself drawn to wander outside after dark. But just as her parents are beginning to despair, a letter comes from her grandparents in Mexico. Seeming to know all about Clara's problems (despite never having met her before), they invite her to come visit them for the Summer. It is the answer to everything and Clara departs on an adventure of a lifetime.

At first, she finds her grandparents' life in impoverished rural Oaxaca to be unbearable, but soon enough she opens her heart to the different pace of life and discovers a great deal about her family and herself. A parallel story about her grandmother's own girlhood provides some elaboration on the timeless theme of self-discovery.

As with her novel Red Glass, which I reviewed a few months back, this is a beautiful introduction to rural Mexican life. Resau expertly interweaves local culture and language into a well-paced and interesting story. One might quibble that the two books bear an awful lot of similarity to each other (as if Resau has trouble getting out of the same rut), but they are each beautiful in their own way and so are both worth reading.

Hold Still, by Nina LaCour

In the aftermath of her best friend Ingrid's suicide, Caitlin feels aimless, drifting through her junior year. A new friend Dylan and a new boyfriend Jayson cannot erase the missing presence of her friend. Over the course of a year, this book traces Caitlin's grieving process and coming to terms. When Caitlin discovers the dead girl's journal under her own bed and she starts to read it, she learns lots about her friend that she didn't know before.

There are plenty of books about grieving and loss in the YA cannon. And more than a few of them have come out in the last year. This one, however, really stands out from the pack for several reasons.

LaCour is a formidable writing presence. The great challenge with writing a book like this is keeping the pace moving. It is far too easy to fall into navel gazing and melancholy. And it is similarly easy to pull out the stops and go for melodrama in an attempt to avoid the lethargy. LaCour achieves the perfect balance, never letter Caitlin become a whimpering helpless mess yet not resorting to extreme (and uncharacteristic) emotions. Instead, we get a beautifully-written story about coping.

As usual, what I really keyed in on was the way that everyone in this book is imperfect, neither evil nor good. The photography teacher Ms. Delani is probably one of the more complex teachers to grace a teen book in some years (and she could have been so evil in the hands of a lesser writer). Ingrid's parents, introduced quite late in the book, are breathtakingly fragile. Pride in place, however, goes to Caitlin's lesbian friend Dylan who never falls into the stereotype that you would expect from the new-kid-at-school (neither that nor her sexual orientation ever become a real issue in this story - although some school-based homophobia is briefly hinted at). I love the way that Dylan's friendship not only supports Caitlin, but also feeds certain key elements of the plot.

And that brings me to another strong point in this story: LaCour's ability to bring it all together. In a novel with a lot of characters and a fair number of subplots (a closed movie theater scheduled to be demolished, romance, struggle with art, the journal, building a tree house), it is always a notable event when the author manages to tie all of the elements together without forcing them. The result is you leave this book never feeling that your time was wasted. Every page is truly important to the story. Remarkable!

So, even if the topic of death and grieving may be old hat, this novel will rank as one of the very best attempts to do it.

Scars, by Cheryl Rainfield

Kendra has been going through a lot in recent months. Recollections of childhood sexual abuse have begun to appear out of suppressed memories. To cope with them, she has turned to cutting. And while the self-abuse gives her a sense of release, her level of tension keeps rising as she becomes convinced that her abuser (who she cannot remember) is following her in an attempt to intimidate her and prevent her from identifying him (as if she could!). Her parents are both weak and ineffectual and Kendra's only allies are her Mom's gay friend Sandy, her therapist, and a new best friend at school Meaghan, with whom Kendra is falling in love (and who, incidentally, has significant problems with physical abuse at home).

This is a very dark book, but if you can stomach these sorts of things, the novel has a lot to offer for itself. Certainly the story is riveting and will keep you hooked. I'll admit that I didn't care for the ending (the story veered off into a far too easy conclusion when the guns started to appear), but I found the characters compelling. It is always a bit of a challenge to take a victim like Kendra and make her strong yet believable. Yet in this case, Kendra's struggles seemed realistic (and it helps to learn that much of her sufferings were based on the author's own experiences -- it lends credibility to the overall story). That I'm saying this is significant as I've always found cutting hard to understand, and I really got it in this case. Kudos for getting through to the hard-to-reach!

One thing I do wonder is where Rainfield will go next. Once you've written the fictional account of your life, what do you do for a second novel? It seems that she has the skills to write a less autobiographical book, so I hope she will and give us a taste of her skills as a writer, and not just as a survivor. Her own story was compelling, but I'd like to think she could pull it off with someone else's story as well.

An Off Year, by Claire Zulkey

As her father is dropping her off at Kenyon to start her freshman year, Cecily suddenly reaches a moment of intense clarity that she doesn't want to be there. So, she turns to her father and says she wants to go home. Her father, at a bit of a loss for words, takes her home. While Cecily doesn't know what she wants to do next, she does know that she simply isn't ready for college. During the next year, she attempts to figure out why and whether it is something she wants to change.

An insightful story about the jitters and the difficulties of facing change. But for me it never really took off. First of all, because the heroine is sort of a 21st century teen Oblomov (that's college reading folks!) who sits around moaning and complaining about her own lack of ability to motivate. And secondly, because in the process she just comes off as spoiled, coddled, and clueless (anyone here want to guess what tuition/room/board at Kenyon actually costs? it sure must be nice to blow that off!). Overall, it was really hard to relate to Cecily. Ironically, the number of times that her friends and family pointed out to her how spoiled she actually was never really seemed to have any impact. OK, she grew a little by at least understanding a bit about her fears, but she took an entire year to figure it out. Give me a break!

And an old pet peeve about the depiction of my home town: Zulkey has obviously never been to Madison, so don't pay much mind to that section of the book. Madison is hardly a "small town" with a "small lake" (which one? we have four of them!), "cute restaurants, cute theaters, cute stores" (they are nice, but I'd hardly describe anything in Madison as "cute"), and the "main drag" (State Street?!) is actually not home to many head shops. Maybe she should have browsed through Google Earth's 360 view for inspiration! Sloppy research!

So, yeah, original idea with some nice insight here and there, but overall not my idea of a fun read.

Touch, by Francine Prose

When 14 year-old Maureen is "inappropriately touched" in the back of a school bus by her three best friends, the story of what really happened and why it happened is not exactly clear, even to Maureen. And as the people around her (adults and former friends alike) begin to use the story for their own ends, Maureen becomes more and more upset with her inability to explain her feelings and thus ironically less and less articulate. What eventually develops is a fairly complex understanding about adolescent behavior, puberty, body image, and the ways that friendships get torn apart through change.

While I've noticed that this book does not seem to have a lot of adolescent fans, I was nonetheless very impressed by its complexity, bravery, and honesty. I was frankly surprised by the book. My initial feeling had been to distrust the book and the author, but Prose won me over with her very insightful heroine and the painful and truthful thoughts she expressed. Perhaps as an adult, I find the way that relations between boys and girls change during adolescence to be more interesting -- and more poignant -- than a teenager would. And perhaps the idea that the basic fact of growing breasts could be not-so-simple and, in fact, so tragic to this young woman is something that is worth pondering. So, in the end, perhaps this is a YA book intended for an adult audience. After all, puberty is probably far more interesting to read about in hindsight!

I do know that I enjoyed Maureen's character. She brilliantly skewers the supposedly adult people around her (she so brilliantly nails her Mom's insecurities, her Mom's boyfriend's childishness, her stepmother's self-centeredness, her father's and teachers' avoidance, and -- in something of a departure for this sort of novel -- even her own shortcomings. That may not always be so realistic, but it is welcome in a book that is this cerebral. The other characters, most of them flawed in significant ways, are also realistic in their limitations. And the ending of the story eschews any unrealistic happy tie-up, leaving us with an understanding that nothing like this is truly going to end up bad or good.

The ABCs of Kissing Boys, by Tina Ferraro

Ok, so I'll have to admit that between this book's title and its cover, my manhood felt a bit too threatened to read it in public. That's probably a bit of a shame, because this is a decent read that shouldn't be limited to a female audience...

Parker has had her hopes on getting into varsity soccer for some time, so when she discovers that she will be one of the only juniors who is stuck in JV for another year, she realizes it is time to hatch a desperate plan to win a spot with the big girls (and her former friends). Through some convoluted logic, she comes up with a plan that involves her older brother's handsome friend, a large bribe, and a kissing booth. The only catch? The handsome friend insists that before any kissing takes place, she'll have to get some lessons so she does it "right." That takes an even more awkward turn when Parker enlists her neighbor's son (nearly a year younger -- and two grades behind her) to give her the education she needs. And while getting on varsity is what Parker needs to maintain her status and self-respect, being caught kissing a freshman could easily damage her far worse.

It's a silly story, of course, with a plot that's so farcical that it's actually believable, but it has a lovely charm to it. And while the middle drags and the ending ties things up way too conveniently with a combination of coincidence and predictability, these are the kind of fluff that make enjoyable reading. The key of the book's success is the characters. Parker is shallow and cruel to people who deserve to be treated better (her old friend Becca and the boy next door Tristan) and way too sycophantic to the evil Chrissandra (where on earth did that name come from?!), but she has a lot of spirit and a decent enough moral compass to guide her through her authentic adolescent lack of judgment. And that mixture of good and bad makes her very appealing.

Ferraro knows her audience and doesn't condescend to them (no one here is stupid and their behavior is never criticized). The key theme throughout is insecurity and finding self-worth. And it's a message that appeals to readers who are trying to do that. Of course, you want to smack these kids in the head and tell them that they don't need to study kissing (or put up with nasty bullies or turn against their friends to become popular), but that isn't how it plays out in the teen years and Ferraro gets that right.

There is no deep meaning buried in this novel and very little long term redeeming value, but that means that a book like this can be safely enjoyed for being fun to read. And that's more than enough!

Cold Hands, Warm Heart, by Jill Wolfson

Dani has always struggled to get through life with her defective heart. When it finally gives out, she is lucky enough to receive a new one. After the surgery, she becomes curious about the donor and starts a correspondence with the donor's family.

After Amanda dies, her brother Tyler searches through her possessions to come to grips with who she was while she was alive. Receiving Dani's letters helps him come to terms with his loss.

For those curious about how organ donation works, this book provides a lot of useful information. Helpfully, it is also a breezy read with a lively pace.

What it lacks is much of a story. There certainly are lots of characters and plenty of subplots, but very little in the way of an overall narrative. For example, the story of the two teens meeting and communicating certainly happens, but there is no real development, no tension, and no conclusion to draw from it. The kids write letters. They are shy about meeting each other face to face. End of story. One can praise the book for introducing readers to an important issue, but this could have been more effectively done in non-fiction than in this thinly-developed novel.

The Carbon Diaries 2015, by Saci Lloyd

After an environmental cataclysm nearly floods England, the UK decides to pioneer austere carbon rationing in an attempt to counter the effects of global warming. The result is chaos and disorder as the severe cutbacks destabilize civilization. Worse, it doesn't reverse the damage. Instead, over the course of the year 2015, blizzards, cold snaps, drought, and flooding inundate London.

Told through the diary entries of Laura Brown, who would rather play bass in her punk band The Dirty Angels, the global events share importance with the major daily events in her own life of that year (reconciling with her sister, grades at school, trying to be noticed by the boy next door, dealing with her splintering family, etc.). The trouble is that the events all conspire together to overlap and intertwine in her life.

This is an engaging science fiction novel of a near future where the effects of global warming have become too vivid to ignore. I was a bit put off by having it placed so soon in the future (the book will not age well) but I get the author's point of wanting to make sure that the immediacy of the events would be acknowledged by readers. And while I would like to believe that the scenario is overly dire, I respect the intent. One cannot fault the plot. The story is engaging enough to make me want to read the sequel that has been recently released.

What worked less well for me was the juxtaposition of Laura's personal life with the devastating world events. There wasn't much connection between the two and I found the one distracting me from the other. Unlike a book like Life As We Knew It which told the story of environmental collapse in purely micro terms (and thus worked), Lloyd is trying to have things both ways. It just doesn't gel.

Need, by Carrie Jones

After her stepfather dies, Zara gets sent by her mother to live in Maine with her grandmother. On her way there, she notices that a strange man appears to be stalking her. And when she gets to her grandmother's, she learns that boys at her new school are disappearing. At first, she isn't sure how these events are connected, but when some new friends suggest that it is the work of evil pixies she learns that the creatures are trying to recruit her to be their new queen. Before long, she is immersed in the world of pixies, were-creatures, and a legend of magic and dark tidings that haunt this rural Maine town.

Sort of a New Moon in Maine story, but lacking the youthful charm, Jones far too quickly dispenses with any of the trappings of reality that makes Stephanie Meyer's stories interesting in favor of action and adventure. And there's certainly plenty of stuff going on, although it doesn't always make a lot of sense.

While the story did not do much for me, I did appreciate Zara's character. She has a great attititude and a healthy disrespect for the conventional fantasy heroine tropes (hurling verbal insults at the pixie king while he's trying to haunt her is pretty hillarious!). A common thread through the story is Zara's obsession with different types of phobias, but the irony in this is that she really doesn't suffer from any of them. Instead, she is one of the most fearless of the bunch.

Rage: A Love Story, by Julie Anne Peters

Peters has become one of the leaders in LGBT YA literature and in this novel she probes the dark territory of physical abuse within teen lesbian relationships. It's the kind of topic that could easily have been sensationalized or used as fodder for someone's political agenda, but Peters respects her characters enough to avoid those pitfalls.

Johanna is an emancipated minor, orphan, and gay. After being rejected by her older sister (ostensibly out of grief, but implicitly because of her sexual orientation), she struggles with feelings of low self-worth. She has good grades, a steady job, and volunteer work at a hospice to give her a sense of purpose. However, from the beginning it is clear that Johanna has problems letting people down.

Enter Reeve, the object of Johanna's sexual fantasies (which take place in fairly explicit detail in the mythical realm of "Joyland" that intersperses the book). Through tutoring Reeve's autistic brother, Johanna gets a chance to grow closer to Reeve and at first their relationship - while always rocky - is everything that Johanna needs it to be. The reality of the relationship, though, is considerably darker as is immediately apparent to the reader (but completely unfathomable to Johanna herself). Reeve systematically isolates Johanna, severing her ties with school, work, and friends, while simultaneously battering her. All of this seems understandable, given the horrendous conditions from which Reeve herself comes.

While the gay angle is unique, it isn't really essential to the story as near as I can tell (or at least Peters does not present behavior that could be described as unique to lesbian relationships). So I'll focus on this as a story of abuse in teenage relationships. For me, the gold standard in this genre is probably Sarah Dessen's Dreamland and in that light, Rage doesn't really measure up. The character behavior is realistic enough and the story sufficiently horrifying, but the motivations that would drive the characters are not developed. Certainly, we can imagine how an orphan could fall under the sway of an abusive partner and we can understand how the girls are replicating the environments in which they were raised, but that really is not enough to explain what we are reading.

I found myself more disgusted by Johanna's illusions and weaknesses than sympathetic to them. At some point, her constant refusal to acknowledge what was happening became tiresome and I lost faith in her. And, having so carefully defined how important things like her volunteer work are, it wasn't really believable that she would allow it to fall apart so easily.

Peters pretty much realizes the corner she has painted her story into at the end and attempts a radical about-face to clean up the story enough to offer us some hope. But this is rushed and the characters improve in even less plausible of a fashion than they declined throughout the story. If you are going to show character redemption at the end of the story, you really have to show them working for it and the sweat and tears that would help us understand these troubled women are missing.

Fear of Falling, by Hannah R. Goodman

This is the third book in a series (I reviewed My Sister's Wedding and My Summer Vacation in previous entries) and represents something of a break in the narrative. While those two books dealt mostly with Maddie and her family's struggles with older sister Barbara's alcoholism, this book addresses the issues of gay teenagers.

Maddie is now back in school, trying to recover from her loss last summer and fighting off panic attacks. As editor for the school paper, she receives an anonymous letter from a student revealing that he is gay and is currently the victim of an abusive partner. Maddie is surprised to find that the school officials not only won't help her respond to this plea, but in fact actively forbid her from taking action. Convinced that something has to be done, Maddie and her friends hatch a plot to raise consciousness about the trials of gay teens. In doing so, Maddie confronts her anxieties and learns to take a brave jump forward.

Of the three books in this series, this third one does the best job with storytelling, creating a challenge that helps Maddie become a better person in the end. I still find Goodman's treatment of her younger characters a bit rough, but at least they are telling the story this time. There was a lack of logic to the actions and emotions expressed that rang true for me, giving a level of authenticity to this installment which helped me believe that kids might actually do these things. In the end, this story does not actually turn over any major new leaves about gay teens, but it would make a good discussion piece for a YA reading group.

Blue Plate Special, by Michelle D. Kwasney

Three generations of women from the same family, each one telling her story as a teenager, separated from the others by 15-16 years. Each one will make their own mistakes, which in turn sow the seeds for the next generation. In 1977, Madeline meets the boy who inspires her to get the strength to stand up to her alcoholic mother and to make an effort to turn her life around, but all of that changes tragically and quickly. 16 years later, Desiree pays the price for those past injustices, while being subjected to an entirely new set inflicted by herself. And 16 years after that, Desiree's daughter Ariel struggles with her own issues of identity.

All three timelines collide together when Desiree and Ariel are summoned to come to Madeline's bedside as the elder woman lies recovering from cancer surgery. The three women have to face up to how outside forces and their own choices have formed who each of them are. In the end, they will come to the realization that hatred will only take you so far in this world and that they each have a part to play in restoring their lives.

Told in alternating chapters from each character as a teen (and with Desiree's 1993 entries completely in free verse), this is an ambitious narrative about forgiveness, generational conflict, family, grief, and rebirth. It certainly maxes out the poignancy meter (so I'm obviously going to like it!). Seriously, it manages to pull on the heart strings without being exploitative. The characters were flawed enough to be real, but strong enough to be interesting. The themes (teen pregnancy, drug abuse, sexual abuse, sexual assault, abandonment, homicide, etc.) are dark, but are used for great effect. The story (both its structure and its pacing) is a memorable work of art. Kwasney's writing is not terribly lyric (and the verse chapters are nothing special) but I loved the way the story unfolded. And I really liked this book.

How to Say Goodbye in Robot, by Natalie Standiford

In something of the quirky tradition of YA buddy novels like Stargirl, this is the story of a new girl in town (Bea) who befriends an outcast named Jonah (or the "Ghost" as his classmates call him). Their offbeat relationship consists of hitting up a favorite dive bar, listening to the same late-night radio call-in program, and a series of outrageous stunts. A small amount of drama is introduced when Jonah discovers that his twin brother (allegedly dead for the past several years) may actually be alive. This discovery initiates a search and an adventure for the two friends.

More John Waters (the book is placed in Baltimore) than Jerry Spinelli, the book stays away from most familiar teen tropes, and without much doubt this is one of the more original books of the year. The relationship between Bea and Jonah is complex (admittedly bordering on romance, but never consummating it). The result is sophisticated and refreshing.

Quirky books can make for difficult reading and there will be people who love this book because it is so difficult, while others will long for something simpler and more straightforward. I'm generally a fairly lazy reader so I prefer less challenge, but I could see why this might appeal to others.

My overall criticism of the book, though, comes from trying to figure out what was the point of the story. Bea is supposed to have gone through some major character growth (transforming herself from a "robot" into a loving young woman) but I never got that sense of growth. And the subplot about her parent's relationship difficulties seemed poorly developed (and maybe even a bit too cliche for this type of story). Overall, not a lot to really grab you. So, kudos for a creative and quirky pair of main characters, but a thumbs down on what gets done with them.

Breathless, by Jessica Warman

Katie lives in a troubled family. Her mother is an alcoholic and her father is overbearing (and ironically also a psychotherapist). As her older brother begins to lose his grip on sanity (implicit because of parental abuse), Katie is torn between her sibling loyalty and acknowledging the tragedy (which means allying with her parents). Katie's parents, recognizing that the environment has grown poisonous, decide to ship her off to boarding school. There, Katie tries to hide away the secret of her brother's illness and lose herself in team swimming. She's a great swimmer, but it's a talent that stirs up the jealousies of her classmates, particularly when she starts dating the captain of the boy's team.

The very first chapter of this book is stunning and sets a very high literary bar for the rest. That one section alone merits this book special consideration.

Overall, the quality of the the prose is spectacular. However, the story itself has an odd pacing that eventually wore me down. An intimate story like this needs a tight timeline, but instead Warman decided to stretch her story out over three years. To make this work, you can't push the speed of events (that would destroy the intimacy) so instead she lets the story jump ahead long periods (often in 8-9 month stretches) at regular intervals. This advances the story but sometimes leaves us missing key details so she has the narrator recap key events that have occurred in the intervening months. Since this catch-up is distant and rushed, we lose the closeness we feel when things are evolving in real-time. Threads developed so carefully and meticulously in one time period become irrelevent in another (these are teens, after all, and nothing stays permanent for 8-9 months!). At the end of the story, Warman does make a good attempt to pull it all together, but after so many cases of narrative whiplash, this was a hard story for me to digest, no matter how beautifully it was written. A near miss for me!

Viola in Reel Life, by Adriana Trigiani

Because her parents have embarked on a trip to Afghanistan to film a documentary, Viola gets dumped at a private school in South Bend IN. It's a long ways away from her native Brooklyn. But while Viola is sure that she will hate things at the school, she quickly is won over by her three roommates and by the school itself. And she discovers that her talent for filmmaking makes her stand out as someone special in the school community. She contributes her technical expertise to the school play and leaves a big mark. When she is invited to a freshman mixer with a neighboring school, she decides to take a risk and attend it. Within minutes, she meets the perfect boy (a fellow filmmaker) and falls in love. The boy tells her about a film contest for high schoolers and now she has a goal -- to submit a film worthy of winning against her peers.

Trigiani is better known as a writer for adults and this is her first YA novel. This shows in certain ways. For example, Viola's voice is very hard to pin down. I found it a bit too mature but I have noticed that other reviewers think she sounds immature and too young. Let's just say that it doesn't always ring true.

Far more bothersome for me was that the story has no drama or tension and an almost flat dramatic arc (this is especially ironic as the lead character makes a big point about explaining the importance of an arc in telling a story -- so Trigiani obviously knows that it is important). I came to the conclusion that Trigiani purposely chose to avoid conflict in her story (to break the YA conventions, she made Viola happy, adjusted, successful, and popular). I guess it is something different, but what's really the point? I kept waiting for something bad to happen so Viola could have a growth experience, but that isn't what this book is about. As a result, I found it all rather dull.

Carter Finally Gets It, by Brent Crawford

S'up dog? Sometimes you have to go off the deep end and read a book from the other side...

Carter is 14, mildly handicapped by ADHD and slightly more so by his hormones. He has trouble making coherent sentences and even more trouble staying focused when there are bare midriffs and breasts in his line of sight. High school is a big shock for Carter and harder than anything he ever imagined. And no matter how much he tries, he finds his efforts are never quite enough. Each little success he experiences (becoming a kicker, dating Abby, getting a big part on the swim team, etc.) seems to fall through for him, but Carter keeps trying to do his best.

Carter is also often clueless and you'll spend most of the book shaking your head in disgust at how obnoxious, immature, and ...well...14 years old he is. There is a requisite amount of farting, ogling, puking, and boy humor to make anyone over the age of 14 want to hurl. Personally, I never was like Carter, but I have to admit that I knew people who were like this, so I'll vouch for the accuracy of the portrayal. For anyone who's ever felt that boys (or even men) were pigs, this will reinforce the stereotype.

But it's often outrageously funny. Carter can be such a moron at times, that you have to shake your head and like the kid. And in the end, that is what makes this story work as a comedy. He can be cruel and mean, jealous and violent, but in the end he's sweet and his heart is in the right place (even if his brain is in his crotch!). He'll do the right thing in the end without ever really understanding why, but he'll come through. And, in making a character like Carter, Brent Crawford has crafted himself a winner!

I'm looking forward to the sequel coming out this Spring!

My Summer Vacation, by Hannah R. Goodman

Picking up a few months after My Sister's Wedding ended, this sequel continues the story of Maddie Hickman's struggles with family and friends, and in particular with her troubles with enabling her alcoholic sister. The story takes place mostly at a special art summer camp, where Maddie is serving as a counselor-in-training (CIT) and mentoring the creative writing group. She's gone to this camp for many years and is excited to see her old friends, as well as to get away from all the troubles at home. The summer, however, presents new problems: old friendships are ripped apart by jealousy and two new arrivals -- both boys -- challenge Maddie (the first one obsesses over the idea that Maddie looks like his girlfriend who just recently died, the other is obsessed with Maddie in a more romantic sense). But a summer like this is not challenging enough as is. Maddie also has to deal with her sister going off the wagon and her ex-boyfriend Justin trying to contact her.

The strengths and weaknesses of this novel are very similar to those of the first installment. Goodman does a good job with her grown up characters but struggles far more with making her teenagers come alive. Even as I read the book, I had trouble putting my finger on what the issue is. The situations are believable and the squabbles that Maggie and her friends get into are plausible. There's the old annoying bit about a teenager with an obsession for movies from the 80s (and a 70s-era obsession in music) but I've seen it in so many books now that I tend to forgive it. No, what I came to realize by the end of this book is that Goodman just pushes through her youth scenes too quickly. The result is that she (through narrator Maddie) is more telling us what is going on (like an anxious teen recounting an adventure) rather than showing it to us. Surprisingly, the same thing doesn't occur with then grownups. The contrast is quite disconcerting.

This particular book also committed the cardinal literary sin of having a dramatic shift (completely out of the blue) occur in the last 20 pages of the book. I won't spoil it by telling you what it is, but it is safe to say that absolutely nothing in the book provides foreshadowing for it. And none of it was really necessary. The story being told (Maddie continuing to work on taking control of her own life) was interesting enough (even if it was being told at breakneck speed!). To add an entirely new twist in the final inning and allow so little time to develop it is frankly bizarre!

Let me conclude on a positive note. If I was impressed with the way that alcoholism and its effects on loved ones was portrayed in the first book, this second book just takes that to a higher level. Goodman has done her homework (or speaks from a good deal of personal experience) because I not only found myself learning things about addictive behavior, but was genuinely interested in what was being taught. To the extent that these novels are really about Maddie's alcoholic sister and how Maddie and her family deal with that part of their lives, there is some really good stuff going on here. It feels true and also reveals a great deal about the human condition. Oddly enough, there is a real gap in YA lit for books like this and so this contribution recommends this book.

Once Was Lost, by Sara Zarr

Samara and her father, the pastor at a local church, have a fair share of problems to cope with. Sam's mother, whose always managed to exude a stable presence in public has been ordered into rehab, having proven unable to hide her alcoholism and crashing her car. Dad, not used to being a single parent, is both struggling to keep the house and their finances together and trying to find the words to talk with his daughter about the changes in their home. Sam is just sad and unable to express her feelings about what has happened to her family. But then things get much worse when a girl from their church is abducted by a stranger. In the ensuing two weeks, Sam comes to question her friends, herself, and her God.

Prior to this story, Sara Zarr has written a strong book (Story of a Girl) and an outstanding classic (Sweethearts -- which is in the very small number of books with a **** rating from me). This third novel doesn't really live up to those. The plot is quite ambitious but entirely too busy and unfocused. In addition to the recovering alcoholic mother (a storyline done much better in the recently-reviewed My Sister's Wedding) and the abducted child, there is an awkward romance, a possible adultery, a few struggling friendships, and a promising subplot about a boy who feels a calling to minister (or something like it). In my opinion, the family struggle is the most interesting of the storylines and the abducted-child story just distracts from that plot.

It also does not help that we have character problems. Samara is a difficult heroine to like. She is pretty good in her inner dialogues at analyzing what is going on, but she is so bad at communicating her needs that it is mostly a wasted effort. That difficultly communicating is usually a good dramatic device in YA, but when the character doesn't overcome their inability to speak by the end of the story (at least partly), it just becomes plain annoying. The overall promise for character growth never is realized and so we are left with frustration rather than sympathy.

Overall, the story just felt rough. It all probably seemed like a good idea when the writing started, but somewhere before this got published, someone should have raised a sharpened red pencil to the manuscript and started to slice it up. As for me, I'd have dumped the abducted kid and then worked on developing what was left. But regardless, some editing would have really helped.

The Sweetheart of Prosper County, by Jill S. Alexander

Austin is tired of being picked on by Dean Ottmer. In the midst of watching the annual No-Jesus Christmas Parade, she comes to a realization of how to get him to stop: she will win a place riding on the hood of a car in the parade in a sexy dress, waving at the crowd, and rising above her tormentor. But to do that, she first needs to raise a champion rooster and win the County Fair, join the FFA, and get elected as their Sweetheart so she can be in the Parade. Determined to realize her dream, she sets out to do exactly that. Along the way, she struggles against her own insecurities and her mother's possessiveness to find herself in this heartwarming story about personal growth. Some good friendships, a potential romance, and a softly-pitched story about racism and adult hypocrisy also figure in.

This gentle book presents plenty of potential tension and drama, but never falls in too deeply. Austin has her share of danger, but comes through everything just fine (as does her bird). The relationships are largely platonic, the friendships rock-solid, and the bullying surprisingly tame and amateurish. One reviewer called this "a teen book for tweens," and I agree. The heroine may be 14 years old, but much younger readers will enjoy her story.

The plotting of the story can lurch at odd speeds, sometimes lingering for too long on unimportant details and sometimes jumping quickly ahead when Alexander decides that some part of the narrative doesn't deserve telling. But in the midst of this novel, there are some breathtakingly beautiful pieces. The description of Maribel's quinceanera is one of the best-written passages of YA that I have ever read. The grappling scene with the catfish is bizarre yet an extremely ambitious literary accomplishment. The author, in sum, can certainly write. So, if this book suffers a bit from unevenness, it certainly seems possible that we could expect great things to come in a future novel.

As a result, I'd recommend this book both as something fun to read and also for its occasional brilliance. It's not the best recent book out there, but it's in a small crowd of contenders.

My Sister's Wedding, by Hannah R. Goodman

Madeline Hickman reads a lot of self-help book. In some other story, Maddie's obsession might be the cause for some amusement, but when your older sister and your boyfriend are both alcoholics, learning about the dangers of enabling might be considered self-defense. Add in a brother-in-law, mother, and father who are in denial and you have a massive dysfunctional family on your hands. Surprisingly, the wedding, from which the book's title comes, is actually only a minor part of this story about family and the ways that people lie to each other to get through life -- a description that probably makes this slim novel sound a lot more depressing than it it. Comedy it may not be, but Goodman keeps everything light enough to get us through.

There are plenty of books about alcoholic parents and alcoholic teens, but I don't remember reading one about alcoholic older siblings. And combining both an older addict with a younger one, and putting the heroine between them, is a powerful literary tool. As a result, this book stood out as something different.

I did have some problems with the tone of Maddie herself as she fluctuates maddeningly between mature and insightful and downright clueless. Similarly, younger characters in the story suffer from underdevelopment. Goodman is better with the adults, particular Maddie's mother and grandmother (and their relationship with each other), than she is with Maddie's boyfriend and friends Peter and Susan. I never really could tell what the purpose of the Peter-Susan subplot was (and don't even get me started on the non-story of the super nice could-become-a-boyfriend Sean!). In this book, the kids and their problems are fairly unimportant to the plot.

I DO look forward to Maddie's further adventures and hold out hope for her development, but this first book is really a story of Maddie's family and for that it succeeds remarkably, painting a much more complex family dynamic than we usually see in YA. It is nice seeing adults acting like adults (being neither checked-out nor stellar role-models). And we have a nice realistic foundation for future stories.