Shelf Life

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Deanna is a 13 year-old eighth grader when her father finds her having sex in a car with a 17 year-old (her older brother’s best friend). The boy’s spin on the story and the lurid details invented by the school-gossip grapevine make Deanna the school slut. Even 3 years later she is dogged by that incident. Her formerly affectionate father can’t even bear to look at her. Her older brother has added to the family shame by getting his girlfriend pregnant. The brother, girlfriend, and baby all live in the basement. Add in the father’s underemployment and the rapidly aging, overworked mom and you have a fully dysfunctional family.

Deanna finds her home life unbearable and school is no better. She fantasizes about moving out with her brother and his family and the four of them setting up a home away from her father’s disapproving glare. To enact her “plan” she needs money- first and last months’ rent and a security deposit in the San Francisco Bay area requires a pile of cash. Jobs in Pacifica are scarce though so she ends up at a run down pizza parlor. To her horror her coworker is Tommy– the boy her father caught her with. Out of desperation to keep her dream of a new home alive she keeps the job. Daily facing the leering young man.

Deanna’s voice is authentic and her needs and fears feel very real. The author’s presentation of the tense, dysfunctional household and the decaying blue-collar town are very well done. Her growth and transformation are artfully rendered and very believable. There is no deus ex machina resolution to all of the protagonist’s problems. Deanna enters her junior year with many of the same problems to face but the author gives her hope and a new sense of herself. Who could ask for more?

(This title is on order)

By Mr. Doyle

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