People ask me all the time what having Vince MacKenzie for a father was like. What they mean is, was he always crazy?
High school junior Jordan MacKenzie's life was pretty typical: fractured family, new boyfriend, dead-end job. She'd been living with her father (the predictable optometrist) since her mother (the hippie holdover) had been too embarrassing to be around. Jordan felt like she finally had as normal a life as she could. But then came Gayle D'Angelo.
Jordan knew her father was dating Gayle, and that Gayle was married. Jordan knew it was wrong, and that her father was becoming someone she didn't recognize anymore, but what could she do about it? And how could she -- how could anyone -- have possibly guessed that this illicit love affair would implode in such a violent and disturbing way?
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"Nothing like that happens to people like me, not to people like my dad, who changes the oil in his car and pays his bills on time... I mean, imagine it. Your father. Your father. I can tell you, though, it does happen. To people like me." Up until now, 17-year-old Jordan's biggest problem in life was dealing with her hippy-dippy mom, the kind of woman who "might suddenly flop out a boob" to nurse her little brother. She much preferred the company of her calm, measured father, "a Shredded Wheat and All-Bran guy," who never embarrassed her in front of her friends. That's why Jordan is stunned when her nice, divorced dad starts acting like a lovelorn teenager over one of their neighbors, Gayle D'Angelo. True, Gayle is pretty, but she's also married. Too proud to let anyone in their cloistered Pacific Northwest island community know, Jordan decides to handle the situation herself. She tries everything from directly confronting her dad, to dating local thug Kale Kramer in a misguided attempt to gain her father's attention. But nothing seems to work, and when Gayle's husband goes missing and the police name Jordan's dad as a suspect, Jordan's life rapidly spins out of control.
Emotional and intense, Deb Caletti's first book for young adults is reminiscent of other recent teen psychological page-turners like Carol Plum-Ucci's What Happened to Lani Garver and Aimee by Mary Beth Miller. Jordan is a realistic heroine that older female teen readers will sympathize with and cheer for as she struggles to understand this suddenly complex world of adult motivations and desires. (Ages 13 and older) --Jennifer Hubert
From Publishers Weekly
The normally stable father of high school junior Jordan becomes involved with a married woman, then kills someone. Told as a flashback through Jordan's first-person narrative (although Jordan does not reveal at the beginning who dies), the novel takes place during the summer on a fictional island in western Washington. Debut YA novelist Caletti peoples Jordan's world with fascinating characters, including a hippie mother who runs a bed and breakfast with her kinetic artist husband, and her best friend, status-focused Melissa, who works with Jordan at a weight loss center run by an eccentric Christian couple. Jordan herself can be funny, making light of her situation with caustic remarks ("He was an optometrist for God's sake" she says when people ask her what her murderous father was like), and also vulnerable ("That's not what people want to hear-that my father was just a normal guy whom I loved, love, with all my heart") as she leads readers carefully towards her eventual realization of her own identity. She also weaves in pieces of advice she's picked up from Big Mama, a wise, warm-hearted fishery worker who often incorporates salmon into her lessons. Two subplots involving Jordan's romantic interests create unnecessary distractions, but captivating details make this scandalous story seem all too real, and Jordan's magnetic voice marks Caletti as a writer to watch. Ages 12-up. Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.
First of all, a confession. I am a literary addict. I read endlessly, voraciously. In lieu of a book, I will read cereal boxes (Cap'N Crunch breakfast jokes, Special K Heart Smart facts), shampoo bottles, pamphlets in doctors' offices about kidney stones and allergies (neither of which I have), and even those self exam charts with the little arrows going around in circles. My books are multiplying, becoming furniture themselves - end tables, nightstands. On one wall, I have a bookshelf, minus the shelf. I get restless, even sad, when I leave a fictional world I love and am not yet immersed in another. The highest compliment I've gotten about one of my books was from a reader who said she read slower as she approached its end, rationed out the remaining pages because she couldn't bear for it to be finished. Oh, joy. I knew just what she meant.
I was happily hooked at a young age. I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, and was one of those quiet kids carting home a stack of books. Was? Still am. My mother says there were several years where they never saw me; they just shoved reading material and food under my door (not true, but pretty close). My parents said I'd mess up my eyes reading at night in the back of the car. They were probably right.
Writing, too, was part of my life since I was six or seven. I would get an idea, then bolt off to write it down. A hippie teacher of mine gave encouragement. "Groovy," he'd scrawl, and I had a sense I was on to something. After we moved to the Seattle area when I was twelve, I continued writing - short stories, bad poetry, and later, lyrics.
Being a writer was the only thing I ever wanted to be, but I didn't have the courage to study creative writing in college. I pictured rooms full of people wearing berets and dressed in all black, talking about Turgenev, which sounded a lot like the noise that escaped my throat whenever I was in one of those courses where they asked you to read your work aloud. I worried I wouldn't have the talent, since I didn't own a beret and never wanted one. So I studied journalism. I worked on the radio station, reading the news. What I learned more than anything was that I wasn't a journalist. I earned my B.A. degree from the University of Washington, got married, won the Nobel prize (just seeing if you were still awake) and did PR work. I got serious about fiction writing after my children were born. I didn't want to be one of those people who talked about their dream but never did anything about it. That seemed sad. I worried I would end up sitting alone at the counter at Denny's eating pie and smoking cigarettes, and I've never even smoked. So I made a decision. I would write and keep writing, at least until I was published. No giving up, no going back. I would have the determination and persistence of a dog with a knotted sock.
I read everything on the craft, studied, took notes, wrote and wrote, until finally, finally my fifth book, QUEEN Of EVERYTHING, was published. I would say I'm self-taught, but it isn't true - all my years as a reader, all of those authors I read, taught me. From Mrs. Piggle Wiggle to Tess of the D'Urbervilles. From Encyclopedia Brown to The World According to Garp. Books are what inspire me to write, and to write better. I believe in their power. Books teach empathy and define our lives and times. Writers are our truth tellers, and I strive for honesty in my writing. I want my readers to recognize their own experiences and to see our shared humanity in my work - our mistakes, our triumphs, our pain, those small moments of rightness. I want my readers to miss my characters when the book is set down. If my reader says, "Oh yes, that's just how it is. I know - that's how I feel, too," then I've done my job. I've given what I can to my fellow addict, and maybe, just maybe, I've added a piece to her nightstand.
This review is from: The Queen of Everything (Paperback)
Someone told me this book was for young adults, but it had enough adult themes and wisdom to keep me satisfied. It's one of those novels you can read on two levels, and if parents want to get into the minds of their teenagers, they should check this one out. Deb Caletti is a talented, savvy writer.
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5.0 out of 5 starsAbsolute Fantastic Book!!!, January 4, 2003
By A Customer
This review is from: The Queen of Everything (Paperback)
What a fantastic tale Deb Caletti writes about Jordan and her family and friends. Jordan is a remarkable young woman with sass and self-confidence. The characters are convincing and likeable. This extremely well written book is very sensitive, humorous, endearing and entertaining! It holds your interest throughout. It was not a book that I could put down once I started it and I read it into the night. When I completed it, I read it again as I didn't want it to end! I could vividly picture the characters and places through Caletti's amazingly compassionate and descriptive words. I highly recommend this book to anyone who loves to read a quality piece of writing. Also, I loved the cover of the book! Very artistic and unusual.
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This review is from: The Queen of Everything (Paperback)
Jordan is a refreshing and gutsy heroine in Deb Caletti's first young adult book. Jordan has a smart mout h, a "roll your eyes" attitude with most adults (except her beloved grandfather) and enough energy and smarts to give most adults pause. Her mother has gone off and married an artist on some windy hillside, had his baby and opened a B & B. Her father has become totally distracted by an attractive neighbor who just happens to also be married and Jordan is beside herself with all these "adult" shannigans. As she tries to work out her problems, eventually confiding in her grandparents, she begins falling in love with her best friends' mysterious bag-pipe playing brother--at the same time exploring some sexual/emotional curoisities like Kyle Kramer. No one is really prepared for the course her father's relationship gradually takes, nor the grief or anger that comes when the truth is out. Jordan is a wonderful character who speaks in the frustrated language of any adolescent who is swept into a world of adults where there is no longer any control. She handles it all with more maturity than expected--she's definitly the queen of it all.
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