"In Zanesville," by Jo Ann Beard

Although “In Zanesville” (Little, Brown, 2011), by Jo Ann Beard, is about a 14-year-old girl, it is not a “young adult” novel. It is perhaps the early side of a “coming of age” novel, but this sounds too grand for the way the novel captures the life of a young, smart, adventurous teen, special in some ways but very normal in others. The setting of the story in “a factory town, Zanesville, Illinois, the farm implement capital of the world,” seems to emphasize the middle-America average aspect of the story, but the narrator, named for Jo in “Little Women,” has her own spunky individual personality. Her growing up is portrayed through a series of episodes, such as a disastrous night of babysitting, an ambivalent relationship with her membership in the school marching band, unexpected positive attention from the popular girls in her school, ups and downs in her friendship with her best friend Phyllis, dealing with and worrying about her father’s drinking too much and his mental health, her first kiss, moving in and out of the gifted math class, and much more. Although the concept of the book sounds similar to that of hundreds of other books, the author manages to make this novel original, and to make us care about the narrator. This novel is by no means a “must-read,” but if the above description sounds interesting, you will find “In Zanesville” worth the time it takes to read.