Dad Is Leaving Home

School Library Journal

Gr 7-9 Judy and David Hart are teenage siblings. David has always been close to his strong-willed mother, and Judy is Daddy's girl. This book contains separate, self-contained narratives by brother and sister, describing each one's perception of the post-separation ``crazies'' which afflict the family when Dad moves out. David turns into a zombie who huddles under his headphones, Judy rebels against her mother's restrictions, and the parents engage in trite verbal jabs. Some of the scenes read like a bad soap opera, such as Judy's brandishing of her mother's wedding ring, screaming, ``I should be the one who gets it!'' Melodramatic events precipitate improbable reconciliations between the parents and their alienated offspring. Characterization is shallow and unrealistic, while narrative and dialogue are stilted and cliche-riddled. The author's social worker background intrudes via the profusion of platitudes about the effect of divorce upon children. The flip-side format flops when the hackneyed fractured family is described by two siblings; it's sufficiently tedious when told once. Merilyn S. Burrington, Vergennes Union High School, Vt.