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AN EGG ON THREE STICKS by Jackie Moyer Fischer

AN EGG ON THREE STICKS

by Jackie Moyer Fischer

Pub Date: May 1st, 2004
ISBN: 0-312-31775-1
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's

Abby’s life from 12 to 15 is tightly strung with immediacy as her mother slowly disintegrates. The family—homemaker Mom, typing-teacher Dad, younger sister Lisa—lives in a quiet California neighborhood during the Vietnam era. Mom lies down too often, and one day she smashes both bathroom mirrors. Her declining mental health leads to an intentional overdose of sleeping pills and a year away in a psychiatric hospital. When she returns, her smile and voice are unrecognizable. After a period of supposed stability, Mom tries again to kill herself, this time succeeding. In a risky but successful style, Fischer allows most of her paragraphs only one sentence before the next paragraph begins, illustrating Abby’s lack of breathing space as she strains to hold herself together and move from one moment to the next. Abby “know[s] things no fifteen-year-old should know,” but there are tiny bits of humor and human connection sprinkled throughout. (Fiction. YA)