Starred Review for Publishers Weekly

Hartnett eviscerates modern suburban life in this blistering story of broken families, buried secrets, and foundering lives. Plum Coyle is almost 14 and terrifically insecure, with two older brothers, Justin and Cydar, who love her but are as emotionally helpless as Plum and their parents. Plum prepares for her 14th birthday, desperately trying to stay afloat with a set of friends who are ready to pounce on the slightest vulnerability, and befriends an older neighbor, Maureen, but cruelties and pain are never far away. Plum's secrets are humiliatingly revealed, as are those of Justin and Maureen. Hartnett's exquisite prose is soaked in visceral descriptions of consumerism, human weakness, and an ugliness that lies just below the surface of everyday life; the closest the book comes to offering a moment of hope is when Cydar, by far the most self-aware character, sacrifices to purchase Plum the birthday gift she wants more than anything%E2%80%94a television. It would be easy to dismiss Hartnett's story as misanthropic, yet it's not so much contemptuous of humanity than of what it has become. Ages 14%E2%80%93up. (Aug.)

School Library Journal Starred Review (Sun Aug 01 00:00:00 CDT 2010)

Gr 5-9 Using her characteristic surprising and spot-on descriptions, Hartnett drops the usual intensity down a notch or two in this tale. While events seem to be taking place in a recent past, Plum is like every teen in her emotional upheavals, her yearning to fit into a group, and her obliviousness to the feelings of those around her. The narrative mostly focuses on Plum herself, her older brothers Justin and Cydar, and their interactions with a neighbor, Maureen, and her young child. Plum, who is young for her almost 14 years, has a collection of mundane objects that she treats as talismans to keep her safe from day-to-day humiliation by her so-called friends, girls who either taunt and tease or ignore her. Maureen, who is in her mid-30s, offers sage advice and support, but readers know that her motivations for helping Plum are questionable. The situation comes to a head at the girl's birthday slumber party. Her parents and brothers truly love her but are incapable of advising her adequately and generally watch her suffering helplessly. The deliberate pacing, insight into teen angst, and masterful word choice make this a captivating read to savor.— Carol A. Edwards, Denver Public Library, CO

ALA Booklist (Sat May 01 00:00:00 CDT 2010)

Hartnett, who wrote with such volcanic force in the Printz Honor Book Surrender (2006), adjusts the power of her prose to a soft boil in this lyrical glimpse into the aching contractions of an ordinary Australian family. On the brink of her fourteenth birthday, Plum oscillates between wanting to be older en submitting to her friends' amateur ear piercing d clinging to the talismans of her youth and the comforting presence of her older brothers Justin and Cydar. Hartnett excels at turning Plum's petty desires (like her own TV) into minor epics of heartbreak and longing. More complicated is Plum's friendship with Maureen, the 35-year-old married woman next door, and the dawning awareness of Maureen's relationship with Justin. Hartnett shuttles the point of view between all three siblings and Maureen, and her deft rendering of their interactions makes this book a natural fit for advanced and adult readers. Suffused with the helpless shame of being unable to soothe the private sadness of loved ones, this is another strong addition to Hartnett's impressive bibliography.

Horn Book (Fri Apr 01 00:00:00 CDT 2011)

Almost-fourteen-year-old Plum both craves and fears her imminent passage into adulthood. As the school year starts, the threads of her life--her scheming social circle, her rapt friendship with married neighbor Maureen, her approaching birthday party--converge in disaster. Hartnett's dense, sensory prose captures the misery roiling beneath the surface of Plum's awkward, average existence in this tender, brutal novel.

Kirkus Reviews

Lush with a melancholy beauty, this intensely introspective novel focuses on the experiences of 14-year-old Plum as she leaves behind the quiet ease of childhood and steps into the cacophony of her teen years in 1980s Australia. Cursed with a group of catty girlfriends, Plum worries about her appearance, her place among her friends and her weight, finding solace in a collection of unlikely inanimate objects. Her married neighbor Maureen, who is secretly carrying on an affair with Plum's older brother, supports her. This complicated relationship is just one of the pieces that result in a narrative—told in a tightly filtered third-person present-tense narration that alternates among Plum, her older brothers, Justin and Cydar, and Maureen—that seems geared more for an older audience than teens. The hazily nostalgic tone also feels like one an adult reader might better appreciate. Deeply discomfiting and artful in its use of language, this unusual and moody chronicle of Plum's horridly awkward adolescence will captivate sophisticated readers, but it likely won't be for everyone. (Fiction. 14 & up)