This winning portrayal of a teenage girl's loves and losses, written in Sones's (What My Mother Doesn't Know
) signature free-verse style, opens as 15-year-old Ruby is en route from Boston to L.A. ("Hell
A" as she calls it). Following her mother's untimely death (in a poem called "Maybe You're Wondering About It," Ruby furiously says, "But that's just tough./ Because I'm not even going to go in
/ to how she died"), Ruby leaves behind her best friend Lizzie and her boyfriend Ray, to live with a father she's never met. Whip Logan, a famous actor, seems anxious to kindle a relationship; however, when Ruby meets him, she thinks: "I don't know whether/ to ask him for his autograph,/ kick him in the balls,/ or run." The scene in California proves "deeply surreal": neighbor Cameron Diaz pops over, Brad Pitt grins at her in the local bookstore, and at the high school she enrolls in "Dream Interpretation Through the Ages." The only person Ruby feels comfortable with is her father's live-in "assistant/slash personal trainer," Max, whom Ruby believes is gay. Sones gives the audience clear signals of what Ruby can't allow herself to take in. Readers will accept some melodrama because, even with a few contrivances, Ruby's voice conveys genuine emotions. Ages 12-up. (May)
