MAXINE BANKS IS GETTING MARRIED

From the first line, the eponymous narrator—affectionate, funny and smart—draws readers into her story with the same strong will she uses to persuade her longtime boyfriend, Brian, to tie the knot. Now that her best friend is married, plus-size Maxine, 17, longs for her own wedding and escape from the selfish mother who’s always valued her boyfriend du jour higher than her daughter. Sights fixed on wedded bliss, headstrong Maxine ignores abundant warning signs that Brian is ambivalent, and the marriage quickly collapses. Instead, she’s manipulated into parenting Demonee, Brian’s troubled cousin, while struggling to finish school and heal her wounded heart. Set in the world of Williams’s earlier fiction (When Kambia Elaine Flew in from Neptune, 2000, etc.) the plot is overlong, repetitious and rambling, while the pivotal marriage is given puzzlingly few pages. However, Maxine, through sheer force of character, holds readers' interest. It’s a pleasure watching her learn from experience and apply that earned wisdom, especially the dawning recognition that if Demonee has the right to be loved and accepted for who she is, so has Maxine herself. (Fiction. 14 & up)