A neglected girl’s chaotic coming-of-age becomes a trending new hashtag in a novel about growing up and getting away by an award-winning author.
Underprivileged and keenly self-aware, SoCal fourteen-year-old Layla Bailey isn’t used to being noticed. Except by mean girls who tweet about her ragged appearance. All she wants to do is indulge in her love of science, protect her vulnerable younger brother, and steer clear of her unstable mother.
Then a school competition calls for a biome. Layla chooses her own home, a hostile ecosystem of indoor fungi and secret shame. With a borrowed video camera, she captures it all. The mushrooms growing in her brother’s dresser. The black mold blooming up the apartment walls. The unmentionable things living in the dead fridge. All the inevitable exotic toxins that are Layla’s life. Then the video goes viral.
When Child Protective Services comes to call, Layla loses her family and her home. Defiant, she must face her bullies and friends alike, on her own. Unafraid at last of being seen, Layla accepts the mortifying reality of visibility. Now she has to figure out how to stay whole and stand behind the truth she has shown the world. (Goodreads)
One sitting. I finished this book in one sitting. Layla lives in an apartment riddled with fungus, black mold, a refrigerator that’s not to be opened at any cost, and the most absent of absent mothers. Layla didn’t understand what deodorant was of why it should be used, and at 14, had only ever owned one bra. Layla has had to create mental escape plans, find hiding places in town, discover ways to access electricity, learn to care for her 6-year-old brother, master avoiding school bullies, and so much more.
When the details of Layla’s home life are reported to CPS, and Layla’s brother is taken into foster care. Layla goes on the run. She makes sure to turn in her homework, wanders the city, and keeps in contact with the adults and students looking for her using the hashtag #FindLayla.
I feel like a horrible person saying this but what I love the most about this story is that it isn’t necessarily a happy one?? Without too many spoilers, Layla’s mother (who seems to have some type of disorder) doesn’t seem to want her children. Layla discovers that her mother didn’t put any effort into keeping CPS out of their lives, and walks away from Layla knowing that Layla couldn’t return to their home and was living on the streets.
As social media always does, it continues to be a place where Layla is bullied and belittled even though at that point, the story of her home condition, the fact that she is currently homeless, is known by everyone.
While Layla’s story isn't as heartbreaking of a story as it could have been (it is a MG story, there has to be some hope) it doesn’t have the Hallmark feeling that some books are known to have. It makes Layla real, her story real, and her situation real.
I love this book and I would recommend it in a heartbeat.
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