Briana's Gift by Lurlene McDaniel

From the Publisher

Thirteen-year-old Casey's mother always said that Casey's sixteen-year-old sister marched to the beat of a different drummer. But it isn't until Briana runs away with an older boy that Casey begins to understand what her mother meant. When Briana returns home alone and pregnant, Casey and her mother try to help Briana come to terms with her options.

It was already complicated to think about Briana's choices and then things change suddenly again. When Briana is in a serious accident, Casey's mother sees things one way. Although Casey understands her mother's reaction, she feels she must try to convince her mother to make a different decision. Casey needs to grow up fast and do what she can to maintain Briana's legacy. Will she be able to make her mother understand that there is only one way to accept Briana's gift?

Children's Literature

December is a month that holds sad memories for thirteen-year-old Susanna (Sissy) as she reveals the changing relationships within her family and between her close friends. In December, her father died in an accident at work. In another December, her mother could not work because of rheumatoid arthritis. In this December, Briana, Sissy's sixteen-year-old sister, runs away with her boyfriend to Los Angeles. Her mother is resigned that Briana has made her choice and will not change her mind. Eight months later, Briana returns home to Tennessee via bus and hitchhiking. She is no longer with her boyfriend and she is pregnant. Sissy looks forward to becoming an aunt while her mother considers the situation in an objective and practical manner by examining Briana's choices. Meanwhile, the long-time relationship of Sissy and her friends, Melody and Stu, transforms in nature as subtle indications of change becomes apparent with time. Then, an unexpected tragedy strikes Briana and lives are in the balance. Sissy and her mother have opposing opinions and they will need each other's strength to face the challenges ahead of them to find hope and promise.

VOYA

Thirteen-year-old Sissy has disliked the holiday season ever since her father died in an accident two weeks before Christmas when she was five. Her rebellious teenage sister, Briana, runs away with her boyfriend shortly after school lets out for winter break, leaving Sissy and her sickly mother in poor spirits. The prodigal daughter returns a few months later, pregnant and alone. Sissy is overjoyed at the prospect of being an aunt, but her mother and Briana share a sobered attitude toward the imminent birth. When Briana collapses at work because of a brain aneurysm, Sissy and her mother are overwhelmed with grief and the impending responsibility of raising an infant. Sissy suddenly has a great deal with which to cope, from her first crush to convincing her mother not to give her niece up for adoption. As always, McDaniel pulls out all the melodramatic stops in this weepy read. And as always, this reviewer marvels at the author's ability to combine such incongruous topics as a pregnant brain-dead teenaged sister, an arthritic mother, and unrequited love into so few pages. The unrequited love story line is the most refreshing change to McDaniel's typical romantic endings. There are subtle differences in her use of colloquial dialogue, which offers an additional bonus. Her tissue-laden fans will rejoice in this newest addition to her teen angst literature genre.

Product Details

• ISBN: 0440238692
  
• ISBN-13: 9780440238690
• Format: Mass Market Paperback, 160pp
• Publisher: Bantam Doubleday Dell Books for Young Readers
• Pub. Date: March 2008
• Edition Description: Reprint
• Sales Rank: 32,557
• Age Range: Young Adult
• Series: Lurlene Mcdaniel (Paperback) Ser.

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Briana's Gift

Random House

All right reserved.

ISBN: 0385731604

Chapter One

one

I'm probably the only girl in the world who hates the month of December. I know Christmas comes in December, but so what? Every bad, awful thing that's ever happened in my family has happened in December. Like when I was five and Daddy died in an accident at the steel mill just two weeks before Christmas and we had to move to Tennessee and live with Grandma. And when I was eight and Mom was told in the first week of December she had rheumatoid arthritis and so she couldn't work and had to set up her own at-home business. And when I was almost fourteen, my sister, Briana, ran away from home on a cold December Saturday, just after school let out for the holiday break.

Mom said later, "I should have seen it coming."

But neither of us had.

Our mother always said that Briana marched to the beat of a different drummer, which I totally got because I'm in the marching band at school and staying in step is a must. When she was just sixteen, Bree took off with Jerry Stevens, a nineteen-year-old guy Mom called "worthless, hateful and without a lick of sense," but that Bree swore she loved more than anything. Bree and Mom had lots of fights about Bree dating Jerry, and then on a Saturday morning when Mom had driven into town to Pruitt's Food Mart for groceries, Bree comes down the stairs with two suitcases and a duffel bag and drops them at the front door.

"Where you going?" Iask. I'm sprawled on the sofa watching a cartoon and eating Cheetos. I like the old cartoons; plus, it's a good way to spend a Saturday until Mom makes me do my chores, which wasn't going to happen until she came home from the store. My fingers are covered with orange Cheetos dust and I lick them.

Bree scowls. "That's disgusting." She looks out the high glass window of the door. "I'm leaving."

"For where?"

"Los Angeles."

"Why?"

"Me and Jerry are going to find jobs."

"You don't know anyone in Los Angeles," I remind her. We live in farm country, in Duncanville, a small town in middle Tennessee, three hours from Nashville, only forty minutes from Chattanooga, which I guess Bree figures are both too close to home.

"We're going clear across country, seeing everything there is to see on the way. When we get to Hollywood, we'll get a place of our own and be happy forever." Her green eyes sparkle.

"Mom's not going to let you go." Bree had taken off twice before and Mom had gotten the sheriff to fetch her home.

"It's different this time."

"How so?"

"I left a letter in my room. It explains everything."

"What about school?"

"I'm finished with school. I can quit if I want to. You finish school."

"But-"

A horn honks outside and Bree throws open the door and grabs her bags. "I'm out of here."

I follow her onto the front porch, stop when I see Jerry's pickup in our dirt driveway. He jumps out, hugs Bree and tosses her bags into the open bed. "What did you pack, girl? The kitchen sink?" He never looks my way.

Bree laughs and kisses him. She says to me, "Go inside, Sissy."

I'm still wearing my sleep T-shirt and my legs and feet are bare. The cold has sliced right through me and frozen me to the porch.

Bree shoots Jerry an apologetic look, runs back and puts her arms around me. "It'll be all right, Sissy. I know what I'm doing."

I feel all hollow, scared too. I don't want my sister to leave.

"I'll send you postcards."

I stand still, my arms glued to my sides, fighting hard not to cry. I'm careful not to touch her with my disgusting orange fingers. "Why do you want to leave?"

"I don't want to be stuck in this place forever. This is my chance to go places with someone I love and who loves me."

The truck's horn beeps and I see Jerry scowling from behind the wheel. Bree breaks away. "I can't keep Jerry waiting." She bounds off the porch, runs to the truck, gets inside and rolls down the window. She calls out, "Tell Mom not to worry. I know what I want. I love you."

My voice is stuck in my throat and I can't say anything. I stand on the porch shivering and watch them drive away. And find another reason to hate December.

When Mom comes home, I tell her what's happened and we go up to Bree's room together. The usually messy bedroom is neat and clean. The bed's made up with the old quilt Grandma sewed before she died and the closet holds only old summer T's and empty hangers. Mom picks up the letter propped on Bree's pillow. As I watch her stiffened fingers rip open the envelope, I cry. "Shush," she says, her eyes darting over the page.

"Wh-what's it say?"

"She and Jerry are getting married."

"Call the sheriff, Mom. You can stop them."

"Why? Once they're married, I have no say in her life."

"But school-"

"She's sixteen, Susanna. You can't stop a river from flowing downstream, and I can't stop Bree from going her own way. I should have seen it coming."

Shock waves roll over me. Briana is gone. Really and truly gone.

Mom gets to her feet and her orthopedic shoes shuffle on the wood floor. "Come on now and help me bring in the groceries."

Bring in the groceries? How can she think about groceries when her daughter, my only sister, has just run off to get married to a guy Mom hates? I swipe at my eyes. Mom puts her arm around my shoulder. "She'll be back, Sissy."

"When?"

"When he leaves her."

"But if they're married . . ."

"It's a lot easier to break promises than to keep them," Mom says. Her face looks sad. I still can't believe she isn't going to do anything to make Bree come back. "Come on now."

Mom shuts Bree's bedroom door behind us and we go downstairs.

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Excerpted from Briana's Gift
by Lurlene McDaniel Excerpted by permission.
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