This one was disappointing. I'd read glowing, GLOWING reviews of it from...uh, some kidlit blogger somewhere? And I liked it, and I was interested in it, but the characters didn't feel real to me. I think it was written too much in the headspace of the Emma-Jean and Colleen, the story's two main characters, and their thoughts were just way too defined and refined. Especially for 7th graders, oh my goodness, 7th graders are the least emotionally stable of all graders! They were supposed to be confused about their feelings, about what was going on, but I was never confused, as a reader, so the entire book felt superficial and fell flat. And, honestly, I didn't believe in Emma-Jean, at all. I didn't believe a character like that could exist as a person, unless she had some sort of autism-spectrum disorder, and as that was never discussed...well, I don't know. Blah blah blah, dissociated from her feelings because of her father's death-cakes.
This wasn't terrible, and I wouldn't hesitate to put it in the hands of a girl who wanted contemporary realistic fiction. But it didn't hit me like I wanted it to.