Title: Taking Hold
Product review: This novel by Virginia Euwer Wolff was extraordinary! As a once teenage mother myself, I really appreciated the perspective of this novel. It was not the cliché story about a teenage mom told through the eyes of the embittered mother herself, but rather through the eyes of her teenage babysitter, LaVaughn. The descriptions of Jolly (the ironically named teenage mother), the filthy apartment, the struggles to make ends meet, and the inability to "take hold" of a life that seems to be falling apart are incredibly dynamic.The book is narrated with a compassion and perception that brings an added sense of depth and sympathy to the situation. Through this narration, an unlikely friendship grows between the two girls-one who is working to save money for college, the other who is working to pay the bills and keep her children fed. Both girls are trying to take control of their lives and education becomes the only way to do so.
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