The Truth About Delilah Blue

Delilah Blue Lovett has always been a bit of an outsider, ever since her father moved her from Toronto to L.A. when she was eight, claiming Delilah’s mother no longer wanted to be part of their family. Twenty now and broke, but determined to be an artist like her errant mom, Delilah attends art class for free -- by modeling nude at the front of the room, a decision that lifts the veil from her once insular world.While Delilah struggles to find her talent, her father, her only real companion, is beginning to exhibit telltale signs of early-onset Alzheimer’s. And her mother, who Delilah always assumed had selfishly abandoned them, is about to reappear with a young daughter in tow . . . and a secret that will change everything. Delilah no longer knows which parent to trust -- the only one she can really rely on is the most broken person of all: herself.In a new novel as witty, sparkling, and poignant as her acclaimed Inside Out Girl, author Tish Cohen uncovers the humor and heart within the most dysfunctional of families.From Publishers WeeklyMotherless would-be art student Lila Mack is the mixed-up heroine of the sluggish and predictable latest from Cohen (Town House). Lila lives with her father in Los Angeles, secretly working as a nude model at the local art school and deeply insecure about the fact that her artist mother abandoned her when she was eight. It's quite clear there's more to her mother's story than what Lila's dad has told her, so it's not surprising when Lila's mother shows up and reveals that Lila—once Delilah Blue Lovett—was actually kidnapped by her father. As it happens, there's a Web site devoted to her kidnapping that she somehow never stumbled across when Googling her mom's name. Cohen drops readers into a sticky familial morass—Lila's father has early onset Alzheimer's, her mother turns out to be quite flighty, the half-sister she never knew she had is more than a little neurotic—that's tidily complicated by a burgeoning romance with an art student. Unfortunately, the characters are hollow, the plot has too many unlikely developments, and the happy ending is as forced as it is far-fetched. (June) Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From BooklistIn order to secure a stealth art education, 20-year-old Lila Mack, who moved to Los Angleles from Toronto when she was 8, secretly becomes a model. She has no other option, because her father, Victor, refuses to pay for anything that isn’t business school. Told by a psychic to “go west,” Lila’s long-absent mother, an artist herself, suddenly reenters her daughter’s life and promptly delivers some shocking revelations about Lila’s father. Conflicted, Lila is torn between protecting Victor, who is showing signs of early-onset Alzheimer’s, and pressuring him to tell her his side of the story. What’s more, she discovers that the idealized memories she has of her mother have blocked out a history of careless parenting and selfish whims. The perspective flip-flops between Lila and Victor, sliding back and forth between the present and 1996, when they left Toronto. The slow reveal of the “whys” and “what fors” feels a little coy at times, but the coming-of-age story itself—the transformation of outsider Lila into self-assured Delilah Blue—proves satisfying and will definitely appeal to the crossover audience that straddles YA and adult fiction. --Courtney Jones