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160 pages

English

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A timely and gutsy YA novel based on the Tony and Grammy Award winning musical from Alanis Morissette, Diablo Cody, and Glen Ballard!Swallow it down-what a jagged little pill . . . Jagged Little Pill: The Novel follows the intertwining lives of five teens whose world is changed forever after the events at a party. Adopted Frankie struggles to see eye-to-eye with her mother-who would rather ignore a problem and preserve their "perfect" life than stand up for what's right. Jo just wants her mom to accept her queer identity-and is totally crushed when Frankie, the only person who really gets her, finds herself infatuated with someone new. Phoenix tries to find his place at the new school and balance wanting to spend time with Frankie but knowing he also has to help out with his sick sister at home. Bella wants to enjoy the end of high school and just head off to college without a hitch. Everyone expects Frankie's brother Nick to be the golden boy, but even though he just got into his dream school, he's not even sure he's a good person. Each of their stories intersects when Bella is sexually assaulted at a party, and it looks like the perpetrator might get away with it. Moving, heartfelt, and raw, Jagged Little Pill: The Novel draws on the musical's story and gives readers deeper glimpses of the characters. It's a story about the power of voicing your pain, standing up for what's right, and finding healing and connection.

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Publié par	ABRAMS BOOKS
Date de parution	26 avril 2022
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781647004774
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	2 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,1250€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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PUBLISHER S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the authors imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Originally produced on Broadway by Vivek Tiwary, Arvind Ethan David, and Eva Price and Caiola Productions, Level Forward Abigail Disney, Geffen Playhouse-Tenenbaum-Feinberg, James Nederlander, Dean Borell Moravis Silver, Stephen G. Johnson, Concord Theatricals, Bard Theatricals, M. Kilburg Reedy, 42nd.club, Betsy Dollinger, Sundowners, the Araca Group, Jana Bezdek, Len Blavatnik, BSL Enterprises, Burnt Umber Productions, Darren DeVerna Jeremiah Harris, Daryl Roth, Susan Edelstein, FG Productions, Sue Gilad Larry Rogowsky, Harmonia, John Gore Theatrical Group, Melissa M. Jones Barbara H. Freitag, Stephanie Kramer, Lamplighter Projects, Christina Isaly Liceaga, David Mirvish, Spencer B. Ross, Bellanca Smigel Rutter, Iris Smith, Jason Taylor Sydney Suiter, Rachel Weinstein, W.I.T. Productions/Gabriel Creative Partners, Independent Presenters Network, Universal Music Publishing Group, and Jujamcyn Theaters.
For Lyrics Credits, please see this page .
Cataloging-in-Publication Data has been applied for and may be obtained from the Library of Congress.
ISBN 978-1-4197-5798-3
e-ISBN 978-1-6470-0477-4
Text 2022 Alanis Morissette, Diablo Cody, and Glen Ballard
Book design by Heather Kelly
Published in 2022 by Amulet Books, an imprint of ABRAMS. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher.
Amulet Books are available at special discounts when purchased in quantity for premiums and promotions as well as fundraising or educational use.
Special editions can also be created to specification. For details, contact specialsales@abramsbooks.com or the address below.
Amulet Books is a registered trademark of Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

ABRAMS The Art of Books 195 Broadway, New York, NY 10007 abramsbooks.com
For Erik Helewa.
You re the biggest fan of this musical I know.
And I m the biggest fan of you.
Chapter One
Frankie
I step out of my room and groan at the smell of pancakes. Between that and the sound of my mother s furious typing coming from the kitchen downstairs, I m not sure what s going to be worse: her latest attempt at a Paleo breakfast or being subjected to the rough draft of a Christmas card she s been desperately trying to hone these last two weeks, sharpening her words and our family s accomplishments like a knife.
If you wield your loved ones like a blade, who are you fighting?
I squat down at the top of our stairs. I can hear her talking to herself over the keyboard, as well as my brother, Nick, clattering about in the bathroom behind me. She s definitely reading lines from the holiday letter again, muttering Harvard a little louder than everything else. There s a series of loud spritzing noises behind me, and just like that, the upstairs hallway reeks of a chocolate-scented body spray, despite the closed bathroom. My brother s cologne permeates even the thickest of wooden doors, and I am not riding with him to school today. That stuff will sink into my sweater and never leave.
I sigh and choose the lesser of two evil smells and make my way downstairs, my thick black combat boots loud against the hardwood steps.
Frankie? Mom ventures as I walk through the living room. The protest posters I was up late illustrating with Jo are still sprawled across our coffee table, a dozen bright neon markers popping against the earth tones of our home. Every piece of furniture is reclaimed or repurposed this or that, so Mom has a story to tell whenever one of her so-called friends from around the neighborhood or the school s PTA stops by.
Oh, this table? Rescued from a home that burned down. All proceeds went to the family, of course. The picture frames? So glad you noticed and asked. Built from the old gym floors of a shuttered YMCA. I sometimes imagine the stories the wood could tell, the people who walked on those boards, who played, who lived-
Ugh.
She looks up at me from behind her laptop in the kitchen, and I glance over at the countertop near the sink. It looks like a bakery exploded in here, several kinds of different flour bags sitting in various states of disarray, their contents spilled out over the cold gray marble.
Marble salvaged from a torn-down church, lest we all forget.
Oh, good! she exclaims, looking relieved. Come here, come listen to this. I think I ve finally got it.
She scoots her chair back, staring intently at the screen. She exhales, like this is some kind of performance, which, when it comes to Mom, almost everything is. I mean, it is barely seven in the morning, and she s already immaculately dressed, wearing a white button-down shirt and black slacks that somehow don t have flour all over them. Her blond hair is done up, her makeup is on point, and I wonder who she does all this for. It s certainly not for Dad, not with the way he grumbles around the house and falls asleep in the den. The two of them try to fake like everything is okay when I m around, and I m guessing whenever Nick is here, but for every forced softened expression there s a comment with a sharp barb, waiting to pierce the illusion.
I see right through them. And I ve read enough novels and watched too many teen dramas to know that once Nick and I shuttle off to college, there s no way they are sticking together.
I just wish they d rip the Band-Aid off now.
This wound isn t getting any better.
Dear friends and family . . . Oh, wait! Do you want breakfast? Mom asks, pointing at the middle of the kitchen table. There s a stack of pancakes that look a bit too thick, like someone tried to make flapjacks with the consistency of a Chicago deep-dish pizza. I ve got a plate for your brother over on the counter, but I know you like to choose your syrup.
Yeah, sure, I say through a yawn, grabbing a plate and riffling through the cabinets for the syrup before checking the fridge. They re lined up in a rainbow: strawberry, marmalade, lemon, blueberry, a raspberry so purple it s almost black. But nothing green, because what would green syrup even be made of? Mint? Whatever concoction goes into a Shamrock Shake at McDonald s?
Sometimes . . . I wonder if Mom or Dad know. About me. About me and Jo, and how our night of crafting posters turned into an evening of snuggling and softly kissing on the couch when my family fell asleep. About how it s been more than just that one night, and more like a year of us tangled up in each other, secret moments and whispers when we can find them.
It s the little things like this, the syrup. Like Mom and Dad are signaling that they see me, that it s okay-or it s just another trend my mom spotted on Pinterest, I don t know. There s also the way she loves organizing the big bookshelf in the den according to color, a rectangular rainbow, big and bold, made up of the family s combined books. Dad s collection of Michael Crichton and Daniel H. Wilson, Nick s various Best American Essay collections I don t think he s ever read but that Mom keeps buying for him, my pile of books by Lamar Giles and Ashley Woodfolk, and Mom s massive collection of photo albums, thick as dictionaries.
Our family s story is the only one I really care about , she once said, when I asked her where her books were. I d caught her running her hands over the spines of those photo albums, having just dusted the shelves, like the contents were something so terribly sacred.
She forgets I m the adopted one.
And so much of my story is missing, simply not there for photographs. There s no pregnancy shoot with Mom and Dad, no newborn at the hospital pictures. I m just suddenly there, the memory of my arrival wedged between a series of photos from Nick s third birthday and his first day of preschool. Like a commercial.
I haven t always felt so bitter about this. Being different in this house. Standing out. The Black girl in the white family. But lately, as these cracks keep forming, these fractures between Mom and Dad, the secrets I keep holding close to my chest-about Jo and about how I m feeling, and how Nick just seems like he can t wait to get out of here-it s becoming almost easier to see things that way. I can t help but think how messed up that is, finding this comfort in knowing I don t belong here, in this family.
I grab the strawberry syrup and hope that a mix of this and endless powdered sugar will make the barely cooked dough Mom s trying to pass off as a pancake taste passable.
Pancakeable.
Okay. Mom clears her throat. Here we go.
I grab a seat and get to drowning my breakfast in sticky syrup.
Dear friends and family, Merry Christmas from the Healy family! Mom exclaims, like whoever is getting the letter is right here in the kitchen with us, or like she s on the phone. She reminds me a little of Jo when she s practicing one of her opening statements for Mr. Schneider and Mr. Hudacsko s speech and debate team at school, only instead of a carefully written speech about civil rights, it s a holiday card no one is going to read anyway. I ve seen enough of her awful group of gossipy mom friends to know they pretend they care but don t really. They act more like they re in high school than Nick or I do. And we re in high school.
We hope that you and yours are well, she continues. Steve is loving his new role as partner at his firm, while Frankie-
The syrup bottle lets out a loud pbbbbttt , spattering strawberry dribbles around my plate and on the table. I wince, and Mom sucks at her teeth before returning to her letter.
Frankie , she stresses, and gives me a little smirk, is busy with her art and social justice movements.
H