The Best Worst Thing

“Sometimes I wonder when the me I am right now will get covered up by a bigger me, and I wonder who the bigger me will be,” worries 11-year-old Maggie. Why doesn’t her older sister play with her anymore? What will happen to the baby rabbits next door? Why isn’t her father ever home? Will the school bully get a gun? These are just a few of the questions, big and small, that consume Maggie’s anxious mind in debut author Lane’s emotionally intense coming-of-age story. After a random shooting at a nearby convenience store, Maggie’s mind goes into overdrive. Many chapters are only a page long and read like a growing prayer list as Maggie ritualistically soothes her racing mind: “Front door locked, kitchen door locked.... Please don’t let anyone kill anyone or anything, please don’t let anyone kill anyone or anything.” Though there are no tidy beginnings or endings in Maggie’s swirling first-person narrative, Lane crafts a powerful portrait of a girl wrangling with deeply relatable concerns, which will easily resonate with readers confronting a complex and uncertain world. Ages 8–12. Agent: Charlotte Sheedy, Charlotte Sheedy Literary Agency. (June)