Unraveling

Starred review from June 30, 2008
Baldini and Biederman make a powerful debut with this painfully realistic tale. Amanda Himmelfarb, 15, has good reason to feel rejected by her sniping, bitter mom, whom she's privately dubbed the Captain. Her dad, aka La La Man, and younger, seemingly perfect sister are of little help in Amanda's constant struggles to please. As Amanda narrates, the coauthors expertly calibrate the family dynamics, letting the audience see far in advance of Amanda herself why she sets herself up for rejection: in an early scene, a boy pressures her into giving him a blow job, then dumps her; later, the boy she likes at school fools around with her in secret while openly preserving his relationship with his girlfriend. When he trades Amanda a date to the homecoming dance in return for sex, the tension results from readers' certainty that she'll agree—it's like watching a train wreck about to happen. For great stretches, the verisimilitude is almost heartbreaking; luckily, Amanda speaks with wit and not self-pity. The only false note is an overly dramatic, quasi-tidy resolution–a forgivable flaw in an ambitious, timely first novel. Ages 14–up.

October 1, 2008
Gr 9 Up-Amanda Himmelfarb is the constant victim of The Captain, aka her mother, who spends most of her energies either fighting with Amanda's father or being cruel to her older daughter. As the family drives to Myrtle Beach, where Amanda is eagerly awaiting a reunion with her love interest from the previous summer, her parents argue incessantly. Although she is a beautiful and intelligent young woman, as well as a talented poet, her mother's constant disapproval has left her with dangerously low self-esteem, and she goes from one disastrous sexual experience to another, allowing herself to be used in hopes of gaining acceptance. When she begins secretly "dating" Rick Hayes, she is blind to the fact that he is clearly only interested in her for sex. Ultimately, she agrees to lose her virginity to him in exchange for him "going public" with their relationship at the homecoming dance. Sadly, she spends most of her time in the back of his van, only to have Rick go back to his girlfriend moments after he has sex with Amanda. Through a heart-to-heart with her loving aunt, the teen is able to forgive herself for her mistakes and hopefully move on to make wiser decisions in the future. Rife with raw emotions, the sex scenes are both graphic and sad, leaving readers cringing at Amanda's self-defeating behavior. The tension throughout the novel is so palpable that it is often exhausting. The story moves at a quick pace, however, thanks to Amanda's honest and often humorous voice, as well as her thoughtful poetry interjected throughout."Michelle Roberts, Merrick Library, NY "

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