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Kass Kennedy is in trouble. Her manically ‘up-and-down’ dad has finally lost it. He’s entered her for The X-Factor. This would be slightly less of a crisis if: 1. she could sing; 2. any tiny bit of her wanted to be a star, and; 3. And, if she hadn’t just lost her two best friends over a boy in brown boots.

How is she going to get out of it with her sanity, friendships and family still intact?

Hilariously explores the hopes, dreams and non-existent singing talent of 15-year old Kass, but also depicts a family coping with parental depression – and is funnier, more moving and original for it.

Reviews:

'Addictive. Original. True. … It's a rare feeling when you pick up a book and know you've got something different in your hands, something you won't want to put down - I got that with this book.' AUTHOR, JOANNA NADIN

'Difficult issues treated with intelligence and gentle humour, and complex, lovely, real characters.' AUTHOR, JACLYN MORIARTY

          When I get to my room I’m more out of breath than the stairs would have made me; it’s all sinking in. The times she’s worked late – worked late, or been with him? She’s been coming home, cooking for us, lovingly prepared pasta and a big fat lie for dessert; we’ve swallowed it with a ‘Thanks, Mum!’ and out she’s gone with a spring in her step from the new black shoes she must have bought to impress him. How could she, with that Cane Toad of a man?

            I feel so stupid; I feel the way you do when someone at school pulls your chair as you’re about to sit down. From my desk I pick up a photo in a frame that says Best Friends: me, Izzy and Char. It’s mostly me and Izzy because Char’s camera-shy, but she looks so sweet and she’s looking at me like she thinks I’m something special – not the girl who stole the boy she loves, and not the girl whose mother stole her dad. We’re all smiling – stupid, smiling girls who have no idea that my mother is about to ruin our lives.

            I backtrack; I feel like I’m watching a home movie of my life when I picture Char getting on the bus, that first morning she didn’t seem herself. That was almost three weeks ago – she’s been carrying this around all that time. Why didn’t she tell me? How did she keep something like this in? I can’t ask her; I can’t ask any of the million questions because I’ve ruined things between us. She was right – I’m just like my mother.

          I put the photo face down on the desk and flick off the light, and flick it back on when the darkness takes me back to the alley. Toe to heel I ease the boots off, leaning against the wall, and put them neatly together in a corner by the dusty cello. I sit on my bed, close my eyes and rest my head backwards. I hold my breath for Dad’s return, as if from up here I’d be able to hear anything but the wind skating over the skylight or the pigeons’ babble. Instead I imagine what Dad might be saying to Mum on the phone, and her replies.

            – I’ve been worried sick, Grace. What the hell is going on?

            – Calm down—

            – Don’t tell me to calm down, just tell me what’s happened.

            – It’s ... nothing, it was just that she didn’t want to go through with it. The song.

            - She’s never done that to me before. Not since ... I don’t believe it. She wouldn’t run out on me like that.

          –  Well, she did.

          – Yes but why, Grace, WHY?

          – I don’t know.

            I turn over and press my face into my hands and cry noiselessly. I have betrayed my best friend, and myself, and I can never erase what’s happened. Tonight I have fallen apart and I have no one, no one to turn to.