Where the Stars Still Shine by Trish Doller (review)
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One moment Callie and her mom are pulled over by the police for a burned-out taillight, and the next moment Mom is in handcuffs. It’s not really a surprise, since Mom absconded with her daughter over a decade ago when she feared her marital breakup would result in loss of custody. Within hours, Callie’s father takes her home to Tampa, where he lives with his second wife and two little sons, surrounded by his extensive Greek family. After years of life on the lam with her mercurial mother, Callie freezes under what feels like an assault of affection and material comforts, and her refusal to begin high school at seventeen, her tendency to wander at night, and her habit of casual hook-ups do nothing to contribute to stability. Fortunately, Dad is loving and persistent, second cousin Kat is patient enough to teach her the [End Page 148] ground rules of friendship, there’s a job opening in town she’d probably enjoy, and her latest sex partner, Alex, turns out to be a sensitive lover who helps calm her resurgent memories of sexual abuse by one of her mother’s past flings. Readers will be so involved in cheering Callie on toward the open arms of her recovered family that only after they’ve mopped away the final happy tears will they realize how carefully—dare we say manipulatively?—Doller has orchestrated the drama. While there are obvious connections to genre stalwarts like Cooney’s The Face on the Milk Carton (BCCB 2/90) and Pfeffer’s Twice Taken (BCCB 3/94), if you change out a few nineteenth-century elements for a twenty-first-century Borderline Personality Disordered mother, some steamy sex, and a cozily decorated Airstream trailer you can recognize the sturdy outline of an orphan story classic like Alcott’s Eight Cousins. Nonetheless, it’s an enduring theme for good reasons, and why shouldn’t YAs enjoy a mature riff on an old favorite?
