Girl from Mars

November 1, 2008
Gr 9 Up-Fifteen year-old Miriam feels tired, average, and ordinary in her small German town. She passes the time daydreaming in class, arguing with her mother, smoking in the girl's bathroom with her two self-obsessed friends, blasting music, sitting/sulking in her room, and sneaking into bars. She is waiting for something new, something big to happen to her. Then she is attracted to a new classmate, attentive and engaging Laura, and Miriam comes out of her shell. As Miriam starts to embrace the more serious turns of their relationship, Laura becomes hesitant and circumspect, leaving the changed Miriam devastated, but ultimately not alone. Bach's writing and Tanaka's translation offer well-drawn, familiar characters and prose that's spare yet descriptive. Miriam's narration, alive with Bach's insightful handling and clever turns of phrase, provides a sense of depth to the highs and lows of teenage emotions like Miriam's small-town claustrophobia, her impatience, confusion, concerns, fear, anger, elation, and heartbreak. Underage drinking, profanity, drug use and sexual situations make this a book for mature teens."Danielle Serra, Cliffside Park Public Library, NJ"

Copyright 2008 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2009
Fifteen-year-old Miriam is bored to death in her small German town. Then she starts hanging out with Laura, sorting through a (mutual) attraction, and wondering what it means to love another girl. Very European in its spare style and nonchalant depictions of drinking and drug use, Bach's nuanced portrait of small-town ennui is a fresh, detail-driven approach to a journey of self-awakening.

(Copyright 2009 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

September 1, 2008
Fifteen-year-old Miriam is simply bored to death in her small German town, where everyone has known her all her life and nothing she does -- and nothing they do -- ever comes as a surprise. Then she starts hanging out with unpredictable Laura and her hostile friend Philip, and suddenly she's feeling very much alive, sorting through an attraction to Laura (mutual, it turns out) and wondering what it means to be in love with a girl. Very European in its spare style and nonchalant depictions of drinking, smoking, and drug use, Bach's nuanced portrait of small-town ennui is a fresh, detail-driven approach to a universal theme. It succeeds as a coming-out story by treating the coming-out process as incidental to a larger journey of self-awakening, as "I'm Miriam, I'm tired, and that's it. No more, no less. Ordinary" becomes "I wonder how all this can belong to me. I see how my knees bend, how my feet soften, how the water collects in my bellybutton." The romance is bittersweet -- Laura is unpredictable to the end -- but readers will relate to Miriam's evolution from numb to engaged.

(Copyright 2008 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)