Rich and Mad (review)

Maddy has decided it's high time she fell in love. She chooses Joe, who seems to be flirting with her even though he's in a long-term relationship with Gemma. Maddy's classmate Rich is a sensitive, introspective type who has the misfortune to choose the beautiful but casually cruel Grace as the object of his affection. He solicits the help of Maddy, who, even though she is Grace's friend, is clear sighted enough to try to dissuade Rich from his ambitions. A weird turn of events destroys both Maddie's hopes of Joe and her relationship with Grace, who turns out to be seriously twisted, but the groundwork has been laid for Maddy and Rich to discover everything they have been looking for in each other. The relationship between these British teens is both sweet and sexy as they discover their own bodies and each other's, talking their way through their tentative sexual explorations. As Rich and Mad sort out what they want and don't want based on the examples of couples around them, the book offers something like a primer on the varieties of romantic relationships, healthy and unhealthy. Alternating focalization between Rich and Maddy, the book engages in a level of introspection that will not be to every reader's taste, but for those eager to figure out the emotional and physical dimensions of that crazy little thing called love, this is a remarkably thorough and consistently engaging treatment.