Madonna O?Dwyer is a tough chick in a rough neighbourhood. She can look after herself and everyone around her. When her sister moves out and her sometime-Irish, sometime-drunk Dad moves into a new career and a new relationship, Madonna is not needed so much at home. The DiFrescos at the pizza restaurant where she works still need her and they love her like family. That love turns to adulation one night when Jiff (a Kiwi named Jeff) cuts himself on a pizza cutter and Madonna heals him. She swears she just held the cut until it stopped bleeding, but Angelina DiFresco swears she saw The Madonna, the other Madonna. So prompts a procession of DiFresco sick and lame wanting a touch of her healing hands. Although this Madonna is a product of their own making, the DiFrescos cast Madonna out as a fraud when wheelchair-bound Nonna breaks her hip trying to walk. Without family or work to define her or distract her, the demons in Madonna?s past threaten to overwhelm her. Amongst the chaos stands Jiff who only wants for her not to run away. While this self-proclaimed humorous story is indeed that, it is also so much more. It is an extraordinarily sensitive insight into a young woman?s fears and hopes. It is also one of the year?s best teenage novels.

Finette Devrell is a children?s bookseller.

C. 2003 Thorpe-Bowker and contributors

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