irises (288 pages)

Francisco X. Stork is also the author of Marcelo in the Real World, which won many starred reviews and The Last Summer of the Death Warriors which won the Best Fiction for Young Adult Readers list. And so I was pleased to see a new novel by him. Stork was born in Mexico, but spent his teen years in El Paso, Texas, where this book is set. It is a story of two sisters, Kate who is the older of the two and is a brilliant student aspiring to go to Stanford University and become a doctor. Her younger sister, Mary, is an incredible artist who is happiest when she is drawing. They live in a home controlled by a very strict father who is a minister in the local church. He controls what they do to the extent that they don't have cell phones, have never been to a shopping mall, wear clothes that are not in style, etc. We find out that their mother has been in an automobile accident in which her husband was driving. She has been deemed to be in a persistent vegetative state. Father insisted she be brought home, and for two years the girls have been caring for her with the help of a daily nurse and care giver. And then their father dies. Kate has to decide whether to stay with her boyfriend, or break up. Whether to stay in El Paso and go to college there, or go to Stanford where she has received a full scholarship. Meanwhile, Mary has met a young man from "the other side of the tracks" who is also quite artistic. And Kate has met a very attractive young minister who has come to temporarily cover her father's church. How the girls deal with what has happened to their safe, protected life and the difficult decisions they need to make, makes this a fascinating, quick read. Students need to ask themselves, what would I do in this sort of a situation?