The Other Way Around

December 16, 2013
Life with an uninvolved father and a perpetually disappointed, workaholic mother makes Andrew West feel like he’s “disappearing little by little,” but it never occurred to him to actually disappear. After a disastrous Thanks-giving, 16-year-old Andrew heads to the bus station with plans to visit his grandmother. While there, Andrew finds out that his mother has kept important news from him, and he falls in with a group of Dumpster-diving “freegans”. Andrew has always kept a low profile, but getting caught up in the freegans’ lives and witnessing their sincerity and sense of themselves starts to change him. Debut author Kaufman does a great job of depicting young people who have opted out of conventional middle-class values. Andrew’s position as outsider and observer, coupled with the fact that he hasn’t yet figured out who he is or what he cares about, means that, at times, he fades into the background, but Kaufman patiently builds the insights and experiences that make him more dimensional, not only to readers, but to himself. Ages 13–up. Agent: Lauren MacLeod, the Strothman Agency.

Starred review from January 1, 2014
Grades 8-12 *Starred Review* Sixteen-year-old Andrew is overwhelmed. His parents? They're divorced, and he is in the middle. His school? It's primarily a girls' school, and he can't get a date. What's worse is that his mom is the principal. His education? He is repeatedly told he is not applying himself. His outlook? Uninspired. At Thanksgiving, Andrew's jerky cousin visits, declares him gay, and wets his bed. There's only one way to end the madness: to run away. At the bus station, Andrew meets a group of older hippie-esque teens who live life on terms that would make his mother chug her wine. They busk for cash, dumpster dive for food, and live in an old camper van as they travel across the country. Andrew takes off with them, expecting to have an interesting, if not uplifting, adult-free adventure. As the troupe goes from town to town, he learns about making choices and dealing with their consequences; gaining and losing a person's love and trust; and ultimately, accepting responsibility. In the process, the weight of others' expectations is lessened by discovering what he expects of himself. Kaufman offers an interesting twist to the coming-of-age story by combining Andrew's rereading of Jon Krakauer's Into the Wild (1997) with an on-the-road tale. Often frank, other times startling, always filled with the familiar wanderlust most every teen experiences, this book has wheels.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)