READY TO FALL

When Max Friedman's mother dies of cancer, instead of facing his loss, Max imagines that her tumor has taken up residence in his brain.

It's a terrible tenant isolating him from family, distracting him in school, and taunting him mercilessly about his manhood. With the tumor in charge, Max implodes, slipping farther and farther away from reality. Finally, Max is sent to the artsy, off beat Baldwin School to regain his footing. He joins a group of theater misfits in a steam punk production of Hamlet where he becomes friends with Fish, a girl with pink hair and a troubled past, and The Monk, an edgy upperclassman who refuses to let go of the things he loves.

For a while, Max almost feels happy. But his tumor is always lurking in the wings until one night it knocks him down and Max is forced to face the truth, not just about the tumor, but about how hard it is to let go of the past. Marcella Pixley is a teacher and the author of two previous books for teens, Freak a Kirkus Best Book of the Year, and Without Tess, which received a starred review from School Library Journal.

Her poetry has been widely published in literary journals such as Prairie Schooner, Feminist Studies, Poet Lore and Sow's Ear Poetry Review. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

Marcella is a middle school English teacher who loves leading writing workshops for aspiring writers of all age.