Adult/High School-From fifth grade through high school, Blanco was teased, shunned, and, at times, physically assaulted by her classmates because she was different. She befriended handicapped students, "ratted" on the activities of fellow 12-year-olds at her first boy/girl party, and could not bring herself to dissect a fetal pig. Her experiences with school bullies occurred in a variety of settings, including religious and private schools. At various points in this visceral memoir, Blanco fumes at the injustice of being subjected to psychiatric diagnosis and medication while her tormentors remained unbothered and oblivious, and states that "sticking up for people" and/or being different is a "social death warrant." While her loving parents were sympathetic and supportive, their well-meant admonitions to ignore her harassers and "rise above it all" sprang from adult logic; adolescents simply interpreted her indifference as weakness. The author's emotional torment was partly due to a breast deformity; corrective surgery performed prior to her senior year allowed her, finally, to begin viewing her future optimistically. Adults may consider some of Blanco's scenes as hyperbole, but teens will find them authentic and apt. Many will take comfort both in the universality of the experiences and in Blanco's transformation from an unhappy, embittered ugly duckling to a poised, accomplished swan. Others, if they are honest, just might recognize bullying tendencies in themselves and become sufficiently chagrined to reexamine their views and actions toward nonconformists of all stripes.

Dori DeSpain, Fairfax County Public Library, VA

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