I read the book Waiting for Normal by Lauren Conner Waiting for Normal takes place in upper state New York. The main character’s name is Addie. She’s in 6th grade. She had just recently moved to a new town with her mother. Her father died when she was very young, and her mother just divorced her step father Dwight. Addie’s mom doesn’t have a job, so Addie’s old step father pays for there new “home.” There new home is a trailer home, right in front of a railroad track. He wanted a better home for them but he couldn’t afford it. Addie’s mother still wasn’t grateful. She could’ve been out on the streets. She would always talk about Dwight in a negative way, and Addie always yelled at her for it. Addie and her step father are very close. He is practically like her real father. He comes and visits as much as he can with her half sisters. You could say everything was starting to get….normal. Then Addie’s mother got a job. She would have business meetings every night, then for days, then for weeks. Addie was being neglected by her mother, and her friends knew it. Her friends were right across the street! They weren’t kids though. There names were Elliot and Soula. Across the street from Addie’s house was a gas station, and that’s where they worked. They became Addie’s real family.
One day when Dwight called, he knew Addie was flustered. He asked her if he could talk to her mom, but she hung up. She knew if she told Dwight that mom wasn’t home, he’d ask how long? If she told him how long, she would be taken away from her, again, for child abandonment. Addie started avoiding Dwight. She didn’t know it was hurting him, but she sure knew it was hurting her. All she ever wanted was normal and she knew she could only have that with Dwight. Will Addie ever find normal?
My recommendation: I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to read a story with a lot of drama. Including family issues mostly, but there are other twists too. I loved this book, at first I thought I wouldn’t like it but as I got into I was reading 2 hours of it a night! I thought it was a touching story. I felt as if I were in the story, walking beside the main character Addie as she went through the challenges that were thrown at her. I’ll even admit that I had some soft moments during this book, meaning I did cry. This book is sad yet weirdly high spirited. It was sad because Addie had to pretty much raise herself, making her own food, making sure she had a way to get to school, doing the dishes. I could never even dream of how much work that would be! This book made me realize that some kids do live like this. I don’t think anyone deserves that. I would have no clue to do with all of the time I would have! The author did a good job of making you have that feeling of pity for the girl. I also thought it was high spirited because even though Addie knew she was under privileged, abandoned, and neglected she still made the best of things. Such as on Valentines day she was all alone, so she made paper hearts and hung them around so when her mother came home she would maybe feel happy. I would describe Addie as strong, independent, and friendly. I would think someone in her position would be more of a loner, and stands to the side. Not Addie though, she was talking to her mother about her new friends within a week! She is strong because I don’t recall reading one moment where Addie cried. Maybe that isn’t such a good thing, to keep her feeling inside like that, but that meant she was strong. I think she didn’t want to waste her time crying because she wanted to look like her life was normal, and she thought that normal meant not wanted to cry yourself to sleep every night. I think Addie is independent because she took care of herself weeks at a time. Cooking for herself and making sure she did her homework, I’m two years older and I couldn’t even do that without my mom reminding me to! Lastly, I think Addie is just plain old friendly. She doesn’t judge people. It says multiple times in the book that her friend Helena didn’t have many friends because she was so big. Even though Helena was big, Addie was still her friend. She hung out with Elliot and Soula, no matter what people thought. She would do anything for her mom even though she acts like she didn’t care if she was alive or dead. I think I enjoyed this book so much because addie was very persistent on being happy, and it makes me think that I should be happy my life isn’t like that. I would recommend this book to everyone. Waiting for Normal was the best book I read in a long time.
