Trowbridge Road by Marcella Pixley (review)

Pixley, Marcella Trowbridge Road. Candlewick, 2020 [336p] Trade ed. ISBN 9781536207507 $17.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9781536211924 $17.99 Reviewed from galleys R Gr. 4-7

When Ziggy moves in with his grandmother down the street, June Bug Jordan becomes obsessed, and eventually her scrutiny ripens into an actual friendship with the imaginative boy. June has just lost her father to AIDS, leaving her a pariah in 1983, and her mother has spiraled into an panicked obsession with taint and germs ("You have disgustingness all over your body," she says in horror when her daughter comes in from outside) that keeps her afraid of leaving the house, of food entering it, of caring for her daughter. Lonely and hungry June Bug finds solace in her friendship with Ziggy and in her warm welcome from his grandmother, but she also begins to realize that her family situation is out of control. Pixley writes preteen June Bug with a sure and comfortable voice that helps cushion the blow of her desperate, tragic life, and her friendship with eccentric outsider Ziggy (the two have adventures in a Terabithia–like imaginary land) is clearly an incalculable balm. Home scenes edge into the terrifyingly gothic as June Bug's mother calls frenziedly from upstairs to expel outsiders and abusively scrubs her daughter down, but June Bug's fond memories of her father are reassuring reminders that there were—and could be again—better days. Fans of Kate DiCamillo's Raymie Nightingale (BCCB 4/16) and its followups will find this similarly emotional and ultimately satisfying. A brief author's note offers more information about AIDS and about mental illness.