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A superb first novel, Sharon Wyse skillfully portrays her characters, specially the voice of this wonderfully tender and pulsating story, Lou Ann Campbell an 11 year old girl growing up in the Texas of the `60's.Her mother, a tough, bitter, controlling, neurotic, and sometimes mean woman checks everything her daughter does, she bathes her and treats her like a hypochondriac would: checking if her feces are too soft, or to dry giving her ex lax and other medications so that her daughter's poop looked perfectly brown and the perfect amount, not too much, not too little!!!!! Think about extreme dysfunctional families...Her Mother has lost 6 babies before pregnancy termination and is pissed off with the world and her cheating husband who doesn't care that she is expecting a child and cheats all the same.Lou Ann keeps little dolls in a box, they are her dead brothers and sisters, including the one in the way, he comes out dead and Lou Ann's mother almost dies, she began drinking and denying the reality that she was not going to make it through this time around either.Lou Ann is belittled by her mother, called a whore, a tramp and forced to wear a trampy dress for a while there... this is a heartbreaking and fortifying story because Lou Ann doesn't give up faith, she writes her diary wanting the world to hear her voice, to know what happened, to make her life relevant.I won't go deeper than this outline, you have to feel Lou Ann and hear her voice, it will break your heart and make you stronger, choose life like she did.