Side Effects May Vary

December 23, 2013
An embittered 17-year-old cancer patient and her lovelorn childhood best friend alternate narration in Murphy's grim debut. Harvey and Alice grew up together and were close until high school, when Alice quit dancing at Harvey's mother's ballet studio and started dating a popular athlete. After Alice is diagnosed with leukemia and begins treatment, she turns to Harvey for support and assistance with her short and surprisingly negative bucket list. When the cancer inexplicably goes into remission, Alice has to start thinking of her life in the long-term again. Though the story jumps around between Alice's initial diagnosis/treatment and her remission one year later, the characters and their problems are virtually indistinguishable in both time periods, making it tricky to keep the storylines straight. Alice's anger is believable and a welcome change from portraits of cancer victims as saints, though her treatment of other people, including Harvey, can still be distancing. Harvey is a sympathetic narrator, though, and it's a relief when he and Alice get a hopeful ending after a slow, dark story. Ages 14âup. Agent: Molly Jaffa, Folio Literary Management.

March 1, 2014
Grades 9-12 Sixteen-year-old Alice is diagnosed with leukemia, but following a year of grueling chemo, she decides to end the unsuccessful treatment. Everyone is waiting for her to die: her parents; loyal Harvey, the boy who has loved her since childhood; and Alice most of all. But she has made her peace, having ticked items off her bucket list, most of which involve mean-spirited revenge pranks on those who wronged her (including her ex-boyfriend, Luke). But then, miraculously, she goes into remission. Now what? Debut author Murphy switches points of view between Harvey and Alice, and between Then and Now; all this back and forth gives readers much-needed insight into the complexity of Alice and Harvey's relationship. In the now, Alice's greatest fear in life has become expectations, and she pushes patient, long-suffering Harvey away. What's interestingand refreshingabout this book is that, yes, Alice has cancer, but she is not a likable girl, and readers' emotions will be all over the map even as they continue to root for her ultimate act of redemption. Alice and Harvey's relationship is raw, honest, moving, and unapologetic in its depiction of their individual, and collective, pain.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)