A lot of people have someone in their life who has had cancer. This book explores the impact a cancer diagnosis has on an entire family. It focuses on Tess, who’s a studious, artistic, shy, and slightly fashion-averse freshman. She’s constantly in the shadow of her older sister, Kristina, a social butterfly who’s also a star volleyball player. At school, no one knows who Tess is, except for her one friend. Even her mom seems to prefer Kristina.

The book opens with Tess at a party her sister has dragged her to. She’s desperate to leave but can’t convince Kristina. Kristina come across very effectively as a specific kind of girl at the party:

Kristina continues to grind and sake to the music in her skinny jeans and tank top seriously helped along by a push-up bra. She gets off on crowd approval, like I get off on watching the guys on MythBusters blow up things.

I’m with Tess on that. I’m also with her on this:

… all Kristina’s friends do is giggle a lot and screech OHMYGOD and talk about boys. And take pictures of each other, usually in skimpy clothes. And then post the pictures online.

So I’m sort of predisposed to not particularly sympathize with Kristina, but man, does the book put her through the wringer. Besides, I’m also sort of with Tess when she says, “Kristina doesn’t know what I would give to be like her. So outgoing and likable. Not to mention beautiful.” Not everyone can become that way, even if they try.

Anyway, the day after the party, Kristina gets diagnosed with cancer in her knee. And it shakes everything up. Because Kristina stops going to school, suddenly everyone knows who Tess is because they want to ask her about her sister. Where is she? When will she be back? etc. Tess’s only friend, Melissa, reacts weirdly—she’s not remotely sympathetic and instead seems almost glad that something bad has happened to Kristina. It seems that she and Tess had a mutual dislike of people like Kristina. Seeing her sister vulnerable changes things for Tess, but not Melissa.

Then, Tess’s parents both stop functioning well—her dad detaches and might be having an affair; her mom checks out a bit too, though she at least is around some. Still, Tess has to be the reasonable one, and she finds a new closeness with her sister, providing more support than either of their parents does.

On top of being her sister’s rock and dealing with her newfound visibility to the It people at school, Tess is working on entering a prestigious art contest, the one thing she does to try to keep herself sane. Although she’d been entirely focused on making it into the honor society, she all but gives up on that by missing school and tests to be with Kristina during treatments.

The book does a good job of showing the havoc that a cancer diagnosis can wreak, and it’s nice to see Tess grow. She doesn’t become her sister, but instead changes in ways that are distinctly her, which I appreciated. The secondary characters were pretty good, though at times I did feel some were a little stereotypical. But Tess and Kristina were both very well-drawn.