Dizzy by Cathy CassidyViking, 2004

It’s Dizzy’s twelfth birthday, and her “New Age traveler” mom, who left when Dizzy was four, suddenly appears in her life again, with plans to take Dizzy on the festival circuit for the summer. To the reader, it’s clear very early on that Dizzy’s mom, Storm, is bad news: she’s flighty and selfish and dishonest, and it’s a little uncomfortable to read this book, to have to watch and wait as Dizzy figures this out and admits it to herself. But the settings are wonderfully described, the hippie festivals and the British seaside towns, and there are other, more sympathetic characters, including a self-assured dreadlocked guitar-playing boy named Finn. Some of the pop-culture references are so jarring I couldn’t help rolling my eyes (this boy’s playing this beautiful song on his guitar…and it’s by Linkin Park), and there are some melodramatic moments, but as a book about adolescence and figuring things out (becoming less sheltered, opening up, realizing adults aren’t perfect), this is a pretty good one.