JUST ANOTHER DAY IN MY INSANELY REAL LIFE

Cassie’s (12) life is turned upside down when her father moves out, leaving the family struggling to keep everything as normal as possible. Cassie’s mother sells their house and moves her three children into a condo, leaving behind a decidedly ordinary middle-class life. After the nanny for five-year-old Jackson quits, older sister Miranda offers to take on the babysitting duties. But, like everything else she promises to do around the house, this too ends up falling on Cassie’s shoulders. Between attempting to meet the page-count requirement in her English class journal and negotiating the typical social problems of any junior-high student, Cassie takes it upon herself to hold the family together. Unfortunately, as the family starts to unravel, so does the story. Stereotypes, like the stern, but caring teacher and the overweight, but smart classmate populate Cassie’s world. Additional problems include the erratic behavior of Cassie’s mother and the unsatisfying resolution of the major conflict of the missing father. Overly familiar and uneven. (Fiction. 10-14)