THE SERIOUS KISS
Mary Hogan
HarperCollins
Fiction
ISBN-10: 0060722061
ISBN-13: 9780060722067
256 pages

Libby feels as if her life is really getting started at age 14. She and her best friend Nadine make a pact to have their first serious kiss, and she starts tutoring with her secret crush, Zack Nash.

But things at home are getting pretty bad. Her father is an alcoholic who will not admit it, and her mother hides her own stress in fast food and overeating. More bill collectors visit at night, her father punches more holes in the walls, and her older brother is arrested. Their life soon spins out of control, and suddenly they all have to leave and move to a trailer park with a relative Libby didn't even know existed.

Libby now lives in a retirement community in a trailer with no kitchen. Her new high school in the desert feels like it could be in a foreign country. When she calls Nadine, the conversations are about Nadine's boyfriend and the new crowd rather than Libby's problems.

The cover and back description of THE SERIOUS KISS do not do this wonderful story justice. The focus there is on the possibility of Libby getting her kiss, but actually this is a realistic and hopeful story about Libby and her family finding their feet again in the midst of the ravages of alcoholism. Readers will enjoy Libby's story and indeed will want her to get her kiss, as well as friends and happiness, in her new town.

   --- Reviewed by Amy Alessio

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