Danny's Mom

September 24, 2012
Former high school teacher Wolf’s thin novel for adults (after Camp, a YA novel) begins with Beth and Joe Maller arguing over letting their 17-year-old son, Danny, drive during a snow storm. Joe telling Beth that she should “stop babying him,” followed by Danny pleading, makes Beth relent. Hardly a breath later, Danny dies in a road accident. Beth blames Joe, and soon their marriage, based on little more than physical attraction, deteriorates to bare civility. Beth works as a high school guidance counselor, where she butts heads with the assistant principal, who turns a blind eye to the serious bullying and homophobia going on at the school. When Beth tries to protect students who can’t protect themselves, she goes head to head with the administration in a fight that might cost her everything. Wolf’s broadly drawn exploration of grief and coping is unfortunately filled with tedious caricatures rather than characters. Readers may sympathize with Beth’s loss, and the topical problem of bullying, but the story falls short. Agent: Jennifer Lyons.

October 1, 2012
Former educator Wolf pens a debut adult novel (Camp, 2012) about an American high school where bullying and intolerance seem to be the rule rather than the exception. High school guidance counselor Beth Maller's world is turned inside out on a wintry evening when her son, Danny, dies in a car crash on an icy road. Returning to work three weeks later, Beth does her best to rein in her grief and perform her day-to-day duties with little emotional support from school administrators or her husband, Joe. While a small group of teachers and her father try to provide comfort, Beth increasingly turns to a student's grandmother for encouragement and understanding. She blames her husband for allowing her son to drive that night and is wracked by guilt because she did nothing to stop him. As these feelings spill over into her professional life, Beth becomes frustrated with an insensitive and rigid administration that prefers to adhere to rules at all costs, even if by doing so, a student's welfare might be endangered. She struggles to cope with the realization that, contrary to traditional beliefs, good guys don't always triumph, and integrity is not valued by everyone. When colleagues excuse incidents of bullying and intolerance by sweeping them under the rug, and a group of mean girls threaten a fragile student and even Beth herself, Beth decides to take action. And while the author presents Meadow Brook High as an improbably teeming mass of bullies of all shapes, sizes and ages, she makes a valid point: Abuse of power can occur at any level, can take many forms and can harm numerous people, as it certainly does in this brutally honest, no-holds-barred narrative that, in addition to illustrating this point, expertly blends the account of Beth's personal loss into the story. Wolf writes with insight and authority about an issue that society cannot afford to ignore as she points out that, even though many schools have implemented effective programs to deal with bullying and intolerance, recent cases serve as proof that institutions like Meadow Brook High do, indeed, exist and that more needs to be done.

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November 15, 2012
Bullying permeates both the student body and faculty of Meadow Brook High School in Wolf's unsettling novel. Wolf, the award-winning author of the young adult novel Camp (2012), writes primarily for adult readers as she follows a grieving mother and guidance counselor who channels her devastation over the sudden loss of her son into fierce advocacy for vulnerable teens. Wolf's subject matter is valuable and convincing, including gay bashing, vicious gym-class harassment, and cliques among the faculty and administration that threaten to spill over into the classroom. The novel's villains, however, tend to announce their malicious intentions too overtly at times. The best passages occur in more subtle moments, such as when the narrator realizes that adults often live in fear of teenagers, rather than the other way around. Adult readers may recognize their past selves in the fragile students hanging around outside the high school's guidance office during passing period, hoping for a last-minute appointment or at least a nod from a reassuring face.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)