Unlike most fiction for teenage girls, Dessen keeps it real.
While other authors of fiction for teenage girls glorify Birkin bags or self-abasement in the face of sexy vampires, Sarah Dessen keeps it real. She has built a loyal following for her savvy, relatable books about ordinary girls faced with compelling dilemmas. In this, Dessen’s latest novel, Ruby is whisked away from life as she knows it when her mother, an abusive alcoholic, abandons her, and her estranged sister Cora insists she moves in. Cora, who grew up with Ruby but escaped their difficult home for college, is now married to a wealthy internet entrepreneur who lavishes Ruby with a fancy new bedroom, new clothes and admission to a tony day school. But Ruby has trouble leaving her old life, burnout friends and her own substance issues behind and she has even more difficulty trusting that her sudden luck will last. In Ruby and Cora, Dessen creates sympathetic characters who struggle to make a fresh start while staying connected to their complicated past.