Thin Plot + Whiny Heroine = Ho Hum, But Hopeful YA Novel

(Image from Amazon)

Megan Riddick should have died when she was two years old.  The only reason she's still alive is because Bryon Exby saved her, sacrificing his own life in the process.  Now 16, Megan's a quiet, serious honor student who only feels truly comfortable when onstage performing school plays.  Which doesn't mean she needs more drama in her life.  But that's just what she gets when Charlotte Exby—Bryon's 14-year-old daughter—enrolls at Megan's high school.  Thanks to Megan, Charlotte never knew her father.  And she's not happy about that.

Although the girls don't exactly hit it off, the pair reluctantly decide to work together to fulfill the bucket list Bryon drafted prior to his death.  In the process, they learn some important lessons about friendship, family, and things both fragile and fierce.

If the plot summary for The Truth About Fragile Things by Regina Sirois seems a little thin, that's because it is.  The novel has no real driving plot, which makes the story rather episodic and unfocused.  Which isn't to say the book isn't interesting or compelling.  It is; the threads of the novel just feel as if they're very, very loosely woven together.  Megan, our heroine, isn't overly likable.  She's "fragile," which seems to mean she has to be whiny, melodramatic, and helpless.  While these things definitely bug, The Truth About Fragile Things is, overall, a hopeful novel with some thoughtful insight.  It's not a book that's really stuck with me, but it's not a bad one either.  

(Readalikes:  Hm, I can't think of anything.  Can you?)

Grade:

 

If this were a movie, it would be rated:

 

for mild sexual innuendo

To the FTC, with love: Another library fine find