Imagine being privy to the diaries of both a 16-year-old girl and her mom! Based on their two-year journal project, Wake Up, Maggie! Go Away, Mom! invites readers into the life of a single mom and her teenage daughter, ushering them through the tangle of feelings that come with this familial bond. The dual entries, peppered with poems by both authors, grant a firsthand look at flashbacks of Carol's recovery from alcohol addiction and subsequent divorce, her imprudent dive into a long-distance romance, and her daily refrains from wringing her daughter's neck, as she dangles precariously from the edge of a menopausal cliff.

You'll see her daughter caught in the confusion of school and friends, longing to launch her hovering mom into outer space, who begins her senior year with the attacks of 9/11, trying desperately to hold her fear at bay. Moving from one voice to another, readers eavesdrop on their frequent power struggles, chronic doubts and fears, and humorous ways they wrestle with the grief of letting each other go as they re-negotiate their relationship and move on with their separate lives.

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