Tillit, L.B. Edge of Ready.

Tillit, L.B.  Edge of Ready.  Saddleback, 2011.  196p.  $8.95     ISBN 978-1-61651-778-6    hs  VG-BN  Realistic Fiction

      Dani wants to finish high school but finds her mother’s demands for child care to be a hindrance.  When she is raped by her friend’s brother, Dani faces worse challenges but becomes empowered with the help of supportive friends and a rape counselor.  Dani tells her own story in the first person, a story of life in a rough neighborhood where a young girl is not safe, where she is afforded few opportunities to realize goals and even fewer opportunities to grow up to become an independent woman.  

     In Tillit’s first novel for Saddleback, she has captured the authentic voice of a frustrated young girl who faces insurmountable odds.  Dani’s realities include the lack of childcare, the inability to finish school, threatening surroundings, disappointment, and the need to feel safe once more after she has been raped by her friend Ruth’s brother, Evron.  With the support of Dani’s former teacher, Mrs. Grady, her rape counselor, and Ruth’s other brother Keon, Dani manages to put together the pieces of her life and move forward.   She even  helps Ruth break away from a teenage prostitution ring run by Evron.  Tillit’s simple writing style is characteristic of Saddlebacks’ novels, which promote literacy among deficient readers. Librarians and teachers will find this style appealing to high-school readers who need to feel the satisfaction of reading a book with more mature topics.  The subject matter is universal, Dani is a believable character, and the theme of self-empowerment is contemporary.  Dani survives rape, finishes school & becomes self-reliant

Martha Squaresky