100 Days of Cake

April 1, 2016
A 17-year-old girl grapples with depression, insecurity, and unresolved trauma from her father's death in a car accident 14 years earlier. Molly spends her summer working at FishTopia, a business that lacks customers but doesn't want for grunge. But Molly loves the job; it usually entails watching reruns of Golden Girls while sitting on the countertop, sharing takeout food with her co-worker Alex, a cute, funny guy she loves hanging with but whom she's decidedly undecided about. Meanwhile, she's crushing on her 30-something therapist, who is trying to ease her depression and her ginormous self-esteem issues and to work out her feelings about her dead father. What's more, Molly suspects her younger sister, who looks like a Victoria's Secret model, is dating Alex. And, her mother has latched onto a crazy idea--that baking her daughter a different cake each day for 100 days might cheer her up. Many readers will identify with Molly as she struggles with debilitating self-doubt and flaccid interest in making college plans amid friends who seem positively sugar-highed when discussing SATs and university prospects. The cast is largely white. Teen humor abounds, as do topics of Hot Topic-loving girls, local boy-bands, hemp handbags, and annoying younger brothers. Some readers may be troubled by plausibility issues--a cake a day? Really?--and a case of sexual abuse is disturbingly left unresolved. Still, for a book about depression, this is a pretty enjoyable one. (Fiction. 14-18)

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May 1, 2016

Gr 10 Up-Molly, a senior, grapples with love and life changes in this contemporary YA title. Molly adores her job at FishTopia-she gets to watch reruns of Golden Girls episodes and hang out with her crush, Alex. Veronica, Molly's sister, is younger and seems to be hanging out with the wrong crowd, while their mother embarks on a new obsession, which is to make one cake a day for 100 days. The protagonist struggles to balance a slew of abrupt changes: FishTopia is set to close its doors for good, Veronica and Alex appear to be dating, and Dr. B., Molly's therapist, becomes too close for comfort. Molly, endearingly likable, strives to save her sister, her workplace, and her relationships in this angsty novel. The cake motif, forced into the narrative at random, feels out of place until the very end, when everything coalesces into an "aha!" moment. This book's mature themes-cursing, sexual situations, and an underage relationship-make this a good fit for older teens.

Copyright 2016 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 2016
Grades 9-12 Even though it's been two years since Molly Byrne freaked out at her high-school swim meet, the thought of socializing is still paralyzing. She is more than happy to spend her summer working with her cute friend Alex at FishTopia, where she can relax enough to be herself and watch Golden Girls reruns on the shop's TV all day. Despite weekly therapy sessions, Molly's depression continues to cast a shadow over her life. Perhaps that's why her mother is trying to cheer her up by baking a new cake every day. Goldhagen focuses on the challenges of moderate depression, realistically depicting Molly's malaiseparticularly her relationship with family and self-destructive tendency to keep people at a distance. Also under the microscope is Molly's therapist's questionable conduct. The sweltering Florida heat forms a fitting backdrop for Molly's summer blues, made worse when she gets the news that FishTopia is closing. During a last-ditch effort to save the shop, Molly makes personal revelations that might just let her save herself as well.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)