BEIGE

What’s a decidedly non-hip girl to do when she’s suddenly plunged into the punk-rock scene in L.A.? Fourteen-year-old Katy desperately doesn’t want to leave her mother and her nice life in Montreal to spend two whole weeks with her almost-famous drummer father, nicknamed “The Rat.” Katy doesn’t even like music and tries to bury herself in books, but can’t escape Lake, the rocker girl assigned to keep an eye on her. Chronically angry Lake takes to calling Katy “Beige,” a seemingly perfect label until Katy at last begins to find a side of herself she didn’t even know existed. Castellucci shows wonderful insight as she slowly opens Katy’s mind to new ideas and conflicting feelings. A cast of quirky characters keeps the book interesting, both for readers interested in the emotional drama and in the L.A. music scene, without getting into anything too gritty. (Fiction. YA)