Confetti Girl by Diana Lopez

A review by Rigoberto Gonzalez

Corpus Christi author Diana Lopez ventures successfully into young-adult literature with Confetti Girl (Little, Brown, $15.99 hardcover), the story of Lina Flores, a middle-school teenager who's finding out that despite all those fantasy representations of the heart, "real hearts are reddish purple -- like bruises. No wonder it hurts to love."

Once upon a time, all was well in the Flores household, until the unexpected death of Lina's mother. To deal with his loss, Lina's father buries himself in books.

Next door, the Cantus are not faring any better. Lina's best friend, Vanessa, must bear with her mother's self-prescribed therapy after her divorce: making confetti-filled cascarones out of eggshells. Every day.

The girls are able to tolerate their parents' coping mechanisms at first. Then, Mr. Flores begins to pressure his daughter to excel academically ("Why does he have to turn everything -- even a volleyball game! --into a vocabulary lesson?"), and Mrs. Cantu begins to...

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