Book: Halfway Normal

The best part of this book is the part where I closed the cover and didn't have to read it any more.  I know I should be promoting reading, but with the last two books I've read from Missouri's 2020 Mark Twain list have been terribly disappointing.  I've never been more disappointed in Missouri's school librarians than I am in their inclusion of this book.  Surely there is more quality literature available than this.

From the author's website:

Norah Levy has just completed two years of treatment for leukemia and is ready to go back to the “real world” of middle school. She knows it’ll be tricky–but like the Greek mythological characters she read about while she was sick, Norah’s up for any challenge.
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But seventh grade turns out to be trickier than she thought. Norah’s classmates don’t know what to make of her. Her best friend, Harper, tries to be there for her, but she doesn’t get it, really—and is hanging out with a new group of girls. Norah’s other good friend, Silas, is avoiding her. What’s that about, anyway?

When Norah is placed with the eighth graders for math and science she meets Griffin, a cute boy who encourages her love of Greek mythology and art. And Norah decides not to tell him her secret—that she was “that girl” who had cancer. But when something happens to make secret-keeping impossible, Norah must figure out a way to share her cancer story.

But how do you explain something to others that you can’t explain to yourself? Can Norah take her cue from her favorite Greek myth? And then, once she finds the words, can she move forward with a whole new ‘normal’?

My problem with this book is that it should have a disclaimer for parents.  The synopsis from the author might seem to be a description of wholesome story, but there is just too much hidden in Dee's delivery:  the main character's consistent worry that she will not develop as quickly as her female peers (stated much more bluntly in the book), talk of herself coming of age (again, I'm not stating this as directly as the author), a quick mention of a same-gender relationship that has nothing to do with the story, the cavalier way in which marriage infidelity is handled, the placing of manna in the category of mythology, and one descriptive word that uses a profanity not normally found in a children's book all tell me more about the author's political and religious beliefs than I needed to know.

I appreciated that Norah, the main character, was frustrated with the showy little ways that are connected with cancer awareness, and I thought the author captured her inner frustrations well, but all of the other issues in the book overshadow the good writing.  In short, I would not be happy if my daughter brought this book home to read only to find out it leans so far in one direction that the main idea of the story is lost in the personal ideologies of the author.  These things should be communicated more directly on the cover and not hidden within the lines of text.