SAVING FRANCESCA

Sparkling dialogue and engaging characters make this Australian import a pleasure to read. Sixteen-year-old Francesca flounders when she transfers reluctantly to a previously all-boys school at the same time that her mother goes into a depression. Without her former repressive clique and her mother’s boisterous love, Francesca has to forge her own sense of herself after years of feeling safely invisible. In the process, she makes friends with unconventional girls she’d rejected at her old school, and gauche but ultimately kind boys, one of whom becomes a romantic interest. Hilarious scenes characterize the girls’ and boys’ adjustments to a co-ed school, a fully drawn setting clearly informed by the author’s experience as a teacher. Meanwhile, Francesca struggles with her mother’s depression and comes to better understand her stalwart but distressed father. Marchetta juggles her many characters deftly, infusing the teens and adults with depth and individuality. Francesca’s messy, credible array of emotions and problems will keep readers absorbed to the last, satisfying line. (Fiction. 13+)