Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, by Chris Crutcher

Title: Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes
Author: Chris Crutcher
Publish Date: March 18, 2003
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Pages: 304

Price: Paperback $8.99
ISBN: 0060094893
Classification: Young Adult
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Age Range: Young Adult

Annotation: A disfigured girl and an overweight boy bear the intense and emotional scars of years bullying together. They share a biting view of the world around them until senior year surprisingly sends them into different courses.

Summary: Eric a.k.a. "Moby" and Sarah are comrades that share a common problem. Both are misfits. Eric is obese and Sarah has intense scarring from an accident that happened when she was young. After Moby joins the swimming team, he begins to loose weight his extra weight! But, he fears he might lose Sarah's friendship...
Will Sarah confront her horrific history and the emotions that go along with her abusive father?
And, will the friendship fail or grow in exhilarating and unanticipated ways?

Evaluation: A fictitious story that pulls at your heart for a place in the real world (or even your own world) as something that you can relate to. Both funny and tragic, it illustrates a friendship that will stay with you even after you leave the pages of the book. Chris Crutcher's writing is funny, straightforward and believable.

Bibliotherapeutic Usefulness: A tool that can illustrate love, loyalty and courage during battle with obesity, bullying, disfigurement and an onslaught of other life problems

Reason this book was chosen: Though abusive parents are often dealt with in the pages of YA, not many books deal with obesity. To have Crutcher approach it, makes it a must read!

Shattering Glass, by Gail Giles

Title: Shattering Glass

Author: Gail Giles

Publish Date: August 2003

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing

Pages: 224pp

ISBN: 0689858000

Classification: Fiction

Genre: Realistic Fiction/Suspense

Age Range: 13 and up

Price: $7.99

Annotation: When Rob, the charismatic king of popularity in his the senior class, turns the school nerd into Prince Charming, his actions lead to unexpected violence.

Summary: Fat, clumsy Simon Glass is a total nerd and a loser. Until Rob Haynes showed up in his life, Simon is the brunt of teasing from almost everyone. Rob, a transfer with personality and charm, takes over the school easily and he has plans for Simon. Rob is setting out to make Simon a popular Prom King from his clumsy current state and Rob knows he can do it. And he does do it. Simon rises and rises on the high school popularity charts, but as he does he gets more and more confident and more and more devious and dark. As things get stickier and secrets are revealed this experiment turns deadly.

Evaluation: Once again, Gail makes the suspense and horror totally plausible and again I found myself paging through this book rapidly, stopping only now and then to mouth the words "wow" to myself. I love her perspective and I loved the tone of Shattering Glass.

Bibliotherapeutic Usefulness: Issues with Violence, Bullying, Family Issue, Friends, Incest,

Manipulation, Sexual Content, Sexual Abuse, Murder, Nerds, Peer pressure, Popularity, relationships, Violence

Reason this book was chosen: I have actually seen this agenda play out in school of turning someone from nerd to cool and was intrigued by the idea of a book about it. Also knowing the style of Giles and hearing about end I was knew that no matter what it would be a great read.