THE WRONG WAY HOME

Fourteen-year-old Bent worries about her mother's steady deterioration from Huntington's chorea, a disease she may inherit. Meanwhile, Bent smokes marijuana in order to endure a quiet life of caring for her mother; then her father, remarried, suggests putting Bent's mother in a nursing home so that Bent can join his new family. Bent resists, but finally does move in with him. After her mother's death, believing she has witnessed her father's infidelity to his current wife, Bent travels with friends to Florida in an attempt to ""get away from it all."" But as she becomes reconciled to the changes in her life, she tries for a fresh start with her father. Crammed clumsily together here are Bent's giving up drags, her fear of developing Huntington's chorea, unresolved feelings about her parents' divorce, step-sibling difficulties, and more. If she were a sympathetic character, readers might cheer her on despite the contrived complications--but she seems shallow, self-centered, and as unconvincing as the book.