what happened to goodbye by Sarah Dessen


My 2 cents:

Sarah Dessen is one of my favorite authors. Reading her Young Adult novels is like putting on a favorite pair of jeans, specifically your size 8 pair from high school that fit perfectly and were faded and soft.

What Happened to Good-Bye, Dessen's tenth book, was just released in paperback. Written for teens, this book is so good, their older sisters and moms will beg to borrow it. (But, then they'll want to go out and buy their own copy, because it's just one of those books you want to keep on your shelf).

Mclean Sweet is a high school senior, who has moved four times in the past two years, with her charming dad, Gus Sweet. Gus is a restaurant “fixer”. He's hired by a former pro-basketball player (who sure resembles Michael Jordan) to travel around the country, and improve ailing restaurants, so they can be sold for a profit. Before that, Gus and Mclean's mom, Katherine “Katie” Sweet, owned and ran a restaurant called the Mariposa, where Mclean basically grew up. Mclean's world was perfect, until her mom fell in love with the new head basketball coach at DeFriese College, divorced her father, and gave birth to twins.

Mclean hit the road, then, with her father. While Gus was busy reinventing a new restaurant in each town they moved to, Mclean got busy reinventing herself in each new place – complete with new name, new persona, new fashion style – new everything. Until she couldn't. When McLean moves to Lakeview her senior year, a lot happens. With her new neighbor, the friends she makes, her dad's new restaurant, her mother, and herself. Especially herself.

This book is for anyone who's ever been in high school, who's ever lived through a divorce, who's even eaten at a great restaurant, moved, cheered on their basketball team, or been the outsider looking in. And more. What Happened to Good-Bye is for anyone who's looking for a really great book to fall into. I'm going to read it again.

 Bonus: Dessen's 11th book, The Moon and More, is due out June 4, 2013.


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