Welcome to Glenfair, New Jersey's Little Moscow, where fifteen-year-old Alyssa Bondar lives with her Russian-born, Jewish parents. In their culture, drinking is as traditional as blinchiki and piroshkis. So when her mum starts having bad days, it seems like Alyssa's the only one who notices - or cares. Alyssa would love to focus on regular stuff like her first kiss with Keith, her cute track team partner-or simply come home without dread of what she might find. But someone has to clean up her mum's mess. Her dad is steeped in work, the evening news, and denial. Her best friend Lana is busy-shamelessly vying for a place with the popular crowd who ridicule their Russian heritage. It's up to Alyssa to save her mum - and her family. But who will be there to catch Alyssa when her mum's next fall off the wagon drags her down, too?

 

 

This book is the winner of numerous awards

This book has been graded for interest at 12-18 years.

There are 360 pages in this book.

It is aimed at Young Adult readers. The term Young Adult (YA) is used for books which have the following characteristics: (1) aimed at ages 12-18 years, US grades 7-12, UK school years 8-15, (2) around 50-75k words long, (3) main character is aged 12-18 years, (4) topics include self-reflection, internal conflict vs external, analyzing life and its meaning, (5) point of view is often in the first person, and (6) swearing, violence, romance and sexuality are allowed.

This book was published in 2010 by North Star Editions .

Margie Gelbwasser was born in Minsk, Belarus. She came to the United States in 1979 and then moved to the suburbs of New Jersey in 1986. Visit her online at www. margiewrites. com.