Well, school is finished for the semester and I'm back. I have read lots of great books in the last few months, but we'll see if I get them all back-blogged. The most recent one I've finished is Blind Faith by Ellen Wittlinger. I actually met Wittlinger when I was at the ALAN workshop (a two-day extravaganza for teachers and librarians all about YA lit.) in Nashville. She spoke in a breakout session about beauty, and was very funny and insightful. This is her newest work.
In Blind Faith, 15-year-old Liz watches her mother throw herself 
on her grandmother's casket, and the spiral shifts downward from there. Liz loved her grandmother, Bunny, who was full of verve and life, but Liz's mom, Christine, had a special relationship with Bunny, one that is very different than the one Liz has with her own mother. After Bunny's death, Liz feels terrible, but Christine sinks into a deep depression, not getting out of bed or wanting to open her pottery shop, much less work on pots. Soon, though, she gets cleaned up to go to Singing River, a Spiritualist church. There, ministers mediate between the living and the dead, and Christine believes she is receiving messages from Bunny, much to the aggravation of Liz's father, who is staunchly against organized religion. Liz, trying to please her mother, agrees to attend one Saturday, and isn't sure what she believes. It all seems like a big hoax, but the ministers do seem to know some things they couldn't without Bunny's help.
on her grandmother's casket, and the spiral shifts downward from there. Liz loved her grandmother, Bunny, who was full of verve and life, but Liz's mom, Christine, had a special relationship with Bunny, one that is very different than the one Liz has with her own mother. After Bunny's death, Liz feels terrible, but Christine sinks into a deep depression, not getting out of bed or wanting to open her pottery shop, much less work on pots. Soon, though, she gets cleaned up to go to Singing River, a Spiritualist church. There, ministers mediate between the living and the dead, and Christine believes she is receiving messages from Bunny, much to the aggravation of Liz's father, who is staunchly against organized religion. Liz, trying to please her mother, agrees to attend one Saturday, and isn't sure what she believes. It all seems like a big hoax, but the ministers do seem to know some things they couldn't without Bunny's help.A family, meanwhile, moves in across the street with the crabby old lady who lives there. Courtney, a younger girl, quickly introduces herself enjoys spending time with Liz and her two dogs. Her older brother, Nathan, is Liz's age, but he seems moody and unhappy to be living with his grumpy grandmother. Soon Liz finds out why she hasn't seen their mother: she has leukemia and has come back to her estranged mother's house to die. Neither she nor Nathan, though, can find the courage to tell Courtney. As the relationship between Liz's parents worsens, Liz is more and more confused about death, grieving, relationships with her mother, father, and Nathan, and the changes she sees in her familiar world as a result of growing older.
This is a beautiful story, showing the nature of mother/daughter relationships and the ways in which we grieve, as well as the normal but excruciating evolution everything familiar seems to undergo as we grow from child to adult. Wittlinger always seems to find the right words to create an entirely believable teen world that reflects the experiences of the "good kids" rather than the stereotypical problem teens.
