Dirty Little Secrets.

Omololu, C. J. Dirty Little Secrets.
Walker & Co 2010 212p 16.99
978-0-8027-8660-9 jr/sr VG-BN
Lucy’s takes showers in gyms. She hides her mother’s hoarding, so severe that there are only tiny pathways from room to room, rotting food creating foul odors. When her mother dies, Lucy must keep the family secret with disastrous results. Grades 7 up. This book takes place in a two day period with increasing tension building from one chapter to the next. Told with flashbacks, the reader sees Lucy’s mother as a perfectionist who was a child prodigy musician and a successful cancer nurse but now is a hoarder. Lucy has few friends. She cannot invite anyone over to her home. She often must find a gym to take a shower. She is concerned that her clothes will carry the smell of mold and rotting food in her home. Lucy maintains a friendship with a girl at school by carefully inventing lies about why they must always meet in public or at the girlfriend’s home. Lucy is attracted to a boy in her class and meets him for a date. Events radically change Lucy as she arrives home to find her mother has died in one of the narrow passageways that lead from one room to another in their home. Lucy refuses to call 911 fearing negative media attention. She frantically tries to clean house, giving up as she realizes she can’t make a dent in the trash. She finally decides to burn the house down with her dead mother inside to cover up the family secret. The emotional trauma certainly won’t end but the secret will be safe. A sad look at the futility and despair felt by children of mentally ill parents. An afterword gives web sites and information for children of hoarders. Gripping reading for grades 7 and up. McNicol,Lois