THIEF GIRL

“Bad choice, good choice always come back—like ghosts.” Avvy Go’s mother’s words haunt her. Avvy Go, a student at Oak Ridge High School, lives in a community of immigrants across a railway bridge separating her from the older, richer part of town. Her parents run a Chinese take-out restaurant at the food court, where Avvy works, but she wants to fit in at school, to cross that bridge separating the two communities and cultures. She’s tried the disappearing act, keeping to herself—trying to fit in by not being seen—but realizes that “if you act like a nobody, that’s what people see. No body.” But to fit in, she makes a series of bad choices—stealing, lying and befriending her sister’s enemy. A good girl with a powerful conscience, Avvy consults “The Oracle” in her school newspaper, who advises her to face up to her mistakes. Though Avvy’s first-person voice is didactic, her story ends realistically, with no simple solutions—just a determination to get on with her life, as complicated as it may be. Lee’s prose in this high-interest/low–reading level novel for teens is simple, adorned with an occasional glittering phrase: Avvy’s brother, in his new, too-big white karate outfit, “drooped like an ice cream melting on a stick.” A brisk tale with an important message. (Fiction. 10-15)