First off, thanks so much to everyone for answering all the questions I've been throwing out lately. It's been fun to see all your recommendations. I'm going to compile all the suggestions into a list and let it be my guide! Keep 'em coming - I'm loving all the comments.

Secondly, Darcie, you won a copy of The Lost Summer by Kathryn Williams. I would love to sent it out to you, but I need your address. It's been almost a week - if I don't hear from you by midnight tomorrow, I'll draw another name. So, please contact me! My email is blogginboutbooks[AT]gmail[DOT][COM].

That's it. I'm still in the middle of The Name of This Book Is Secret by Pseudonymous Bosch. It's lots of fun. I should have a review up by tomorrow or Wednesday. In the meantime, happy reading! I'm off to bed. Getting up early to get my kids off to school is killing me (they leave for the bus stop at 7:20). *Yawn*

Things are not going well for Veronica Van Holten. For starters, she hates her job. It's bad enough that she's a junior and still living in the dorms, but as a resident assistant, she's in charge of controlling the drama on her floor. She doesn't have time for her neighbors, she has no car, she's barely keeping up in her pre-med classes, and she's devastated over her parents' impending divorce. Veronica does have a very nice boyfriend, which is wonderful until he asks her for a little more commitment. Now, she's freaking out. While I'm Falling by Laura Moriarty is Veronica's coming-of-age story. It's also a novel about family, about mothers and daughters, and about how to cope when one's life is falling apart at the seams.
For our heroine, everything collides one fateful morning on a deserted highway, leaving her shaken. Her cries for help prove just how much her family has disintegrated. Veronica's frayed nerves lead to a string of remarkably bad decisions, landing her in a heap of trouble. Then, just when she needs her mother, who's always been her biggest support system, Natalie Van Holten shows up at her daughter's dorm - with an overnight bag, an arthritic dog and all of her worldly belongings sitting in a minivan in the parking lot. Can things possibly get any worse? This is Veronica Van Holten we're talking about - of course they can. And they do. Along the way, she has to figure out how to pick up the pieces of her broken family life, her fledgling future, but most of all, herself.
Veronica's crises aren't exactly original, and neither is she for that matter, but you know what? It doesn't matter. She's authentic, so real that my heart ached for her. Physically. I was so engrossed in her story that I felt actual dread balling up in my chest. I had to keep telling myself, "It's only a book. It's not real." That's how strongly I identified with her. The thing that drew me to her, I think, is the following passage. I'm pretty sure I've had this conversation before: