I, EMMA FREKE

With vibrant red hair, an extraordinary intellect and a height of nearly six feet, 12-year-old Emma feels out of sync with peers and life in general. Her unique surname serves to magnify these woes. While Emma acts in a responsible adult manner, internally she is besieged by all the anxieties and insecurities of her age. Atkinson deftly portrays the intense self-consciousness that is an inherent part of the transition between childhood and adolescence. Emma’s flighty, bohemian mother offers little guidance, and Emma longs for a conventional life. An invitation to her heretofore-unknown father’s family reunion seems an opportunity for her to redefine herself. This newfound family, which pronounces their last name Frecky, offers Emma all the orderly ordinariness she has been craving. However, between her blossoming friendship with Fred, the mysterious outcast of the group, and her skirmishes with Aunt Pat, the martinet who demands absolute conformity, Emma emerges with a new appreciation for her unorthodox upbringing. How she reconciles the disparate halves of both her personality and her extended family becomes a poignant journey of self-discovery. (Fiction. 9-13)