Sister Spider Knows All

A sensitive story of an adolescent girl uncovering her past and discovering the possibilities for her future.

For twelve-year-old Roxanne, there are two things in life she can count on: her beloved grandmother, Mimi, and her weekend job at the flea market where she helps Mimi buy and sell fresh produce and other people’s junk to pay the household bills. This is her home and the people she knows and loves are here.

But outside this fragile weekend world, she’s lost. A so-so student with few aspirations for higher education, she feels out of place at school. Stuck in the back of the pack with the other “lardbutts,” Rox just tries to stay out of the way of the popular creeps in her class. And who is she anyway? Her teenage mother left when she was only three months old and her father’s identity is a mystery. And no one, least of all Mimi, will talk about what happened.

But then her cousin John Martin brings home a girlfriend from college who has very different ideas about the way life works. And when Roxanne discovers her mother’s teenage diary, she finds some painful but important answers to the unsolved questions of her past and the possibilities for a different future.

With gentle wit and an uncanny sensitivity, author Adrian Fogelin captures the fragility of life’s certainties in this moving novel of an adolescent girl’s struggles to find her way in the world.

“Fogelin captures the fragility of this unique family with a lot of humor and great characters . . . the story has universal themes of coming of age and searching for one’s identity. Reluctant readers will like the short, fast-paced chapters.” ?School Library Journal

“Americans tend to avoid discussing class differences, and this charming story about a girl who lives in a trailer with her chain-smoking, obese grandmother is something out of the ordinary . . . The lines between the classes become somewhat blurred and we understand that life is pretty much that way, and that a loving, close family is a treasure whatever circumstances they are living in.” ?Kliatt

“Delivered in a wry voice that swings from laugh-out-loud funny to wrenching sadness, Rox’s narrative is neither sentimental nor condescending, and details of place, people, and class conflict emerge in plain poetic imagery . . .” ?Booklist

“A Best of 2003 for Young Readers: Dead-on dialogue and strong, complex characters.” ?The Washington Post

“. . . a richly drawn story of human dynamics, offering both support for people as they are and hope for their growth.” ?The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books Adrian Fogelin is the author of several novels for middle readers and young adults, including Crossing Jordan and The Real Question. She lives in Florida.