True Confessions of a Heartless Girl

Rating:
Summary: Pleasantly Surprised!
Review: But I shouldn't have been. Martha Brooks is a wonderful author, and this book lives up to the high standard set by BONE DANCE.

I often have trouble sympathizing with characters like Noreen, who I sometimes find annoying. But this story drew me in completely and made me care about what happened to everyone. The characters of the elderly women were excellent additions to - it's not every day you find perspective like that in a YA novel.

I like bittersweet endings.

Rating:
Summary: Real and unforgettable.
Review: Even when Noreen Stall has the best intentions, it seems that she screws everything up. And when she makes so many mistakes that she starts to hate herself, she runs from the people who love her. When she runs away from her boyfriend, taking his truck, money and unborn baby, she finds herself in the small town of Pembina Lake. There she lands in the rundown café owned by Lynda Bradley, a single mother of a three-year-old boy, Seth. Lynda is struggling to make sense of a life that could have been so much more. She lets Noreen stay the night and, in doing so, unleashes a series of events that force the people in the town to take a look at their own lives.

When Dolores Harper, who has a gift for helping people, hears about Noreen, she decides to get her to talk. But while she is helping Noreen open up, she can't see that her "oldest friend in the world" might need her support as well. During her stay at Pembina Lake, Noreen makes many more mistakes, including accidentally poisoning Seth's beloved dog and ripping out part of the wall in the café while trying to remove the fading, ugly wallpaper. Will she run again, or decide to stay?

The characters you meet in this book are real and unforgettable. Watching them help each other along gave me a satisfying feeling.

--- Reviewed by Briana Orr


Rating:
Summary: What, really, was left but this?
Review: Here is the quote that begins "True Confessions of a Heartless Girl":

"The American novelist John Gardner, I think it was, said there are, really, only two plot lines: a stranger rides into town, and a stranger rides out of town", - William Least Heat-Moon "PrairyErth".

This book begins with the former. In it, seventeen-year-old Noreen Stall has arrived at the M.T. Café in a stolen truck, her pockets full of stolen money, and a baby growing in her womb. She has arrived in a small Canadian town in the middle of nowhere without direction or hope. Winner of the 2002 Governor General's Literary Award (think of it as the Canadian Newbery), this book is one of the most quietly moving pieces of young adult literature I have ever read.

Author Martha Brooks has created a small stirring story. Individual characters meet and mix with Noreen, showing their own private sorrows and disappointments in life. The girl herself seems to attract nothing but bad luck and trouble, and it's difficult to see how exactly she's going to change her life around.

This is not a story where everything slowly gets better and better for Noreen until, at the end, she's bursting with enough joy and happiness to fill her days. It's subtler than that. More realistic. And filled with beautiful well-thought out characters. Following in a long line of stories in which a single girl finds herself surrounded by occasionally understanding people, this book is nothing so much as an older version of "The Great Gilly Hopkins".

Moralistic parents beware. This story does contain a fair amount of swearing (though I was amused by the Canadian/British bad word "bugger" showing up as well) in addition to discussions of abortion and miscarriages. And I don't know how interesting this book is to kids and teens. After all, much of this story concentrates on the thoughts and emotions of the middle-aged and elderly. Not typical YA fare. But for any teen that is looking for a book that shows real problems without becoming didactic, preachy, or condescending, this story is ideal. There are no easy answers. Noreen isn't going to be saved by the kindness of strangers. This book deals with the truth and its ending is satisfactory in the extreme.

Rating:
Summary: Great Book
Review: I stumbled across this book in my school library.I really enjoyed it. It was cool,well written and honest.I've gotta read more of her books!

Rating:
Summary: True Confessions of a Heartless Girl
Review: Noreen is a seventeen year old girl who has had a rough beginning in life. Her mother, whom she calls "Amazing," is quite the opposite, and her step-father, whom she calls "Stupid-head," is exactly that. Noreen moves out to live with her step-sister Gladys and her husband to get away from her home-life. In True Confessions of a Heartless Girl, Martha Brooks tells of one girl's struggle for acceptance and a place in the world.
One evening while Noreen is walking along the highway after leaving her most recent boyfriend, Wesley, a truck driver, picks her up. He falls in love with her immediately. After spending a few nights in a hotel room together, Wesley and Noreen go tell Gladys, who has been worried about Noreen's whereabouts for days, that they are moving in together.
Noreen carries on a boring life with Wesley. He goes to work and comes home while she basically stays in bed all day. One day she finds a coffee can full of money and decides to clean up the house. Noreen begins to spend Wesley's money and when he finds out, he is furious. The next day Noreen takes the rest of the money, her belongings, and Wesley's truck and leaves.
She drives through a storm and ends up in a small Canadian town. She walks into a café and all of her problems come out. The owner of the café takes Noreen under her wing and tries to help her. Noreen ends up nearly killing their dog, setting fire to her temporary living quarters, and tearing down a wall in the café. Through all of this she finds out that she is pregnant with Wesley's child. Once again Noreen picks up her belongings and disappears. Only this time she comes back.
The book takes the reader through the mind of a troubled teen who is struggling to grow up. It also reveals the troubles from the past that many older adults deal with. Together Noreen and the people she meets at the café help each other out. It also shows the true power of love and friendship.
Brooks writes the novel freely which makes it an easy read. It holds the reader's attention, and tells a powerful story at the same time. She reveals many of life's hard-learned lessons through the encounter of total strangers. This is an entertaining and influential book for early teens through adults.

Rating:
Summary: True Confessions of a Heartless Girl
Review: Noreen is a seventeen year old girl who has had a rough beginning in life. Her mother, whom she calls "Amazing," is quite the opposite, and her step-father, whom she calls "Stupid-head," is exactly that. Noreen moves out to live with her step-sister Gladys and her husband to get away from her home-life. In True Confessions of a Heartless Girl, Martha Brooks tells of one girl's struggle for acceptance and a place in the world.
One evening while Noreen is walking along the highway after leaving her most recent boyfriend, Wesley, a truck driver, picks her up. He falls in love with her immediately. After spending a few nights in a hotel room together, Wesley and Noreen go tell Gladys, who has been worried about Noreen's whereabouts for days, that they are moving in together.
Noreen carries on a boring life with Wesley. He goes to work and comes home while she basically stays in bed all day. One day she finds a coffee can full of money and decides to clean up the house. Noreen begins to spend Wesley's money and when he finds out, he is furious. The next day Noreen takes the rest of the money, her belongings, and Wesley's truck and leaves.
She drives through a storm and ends up in a small Canadian town. She walks into a café and all of her problems come out. The owner of the café takes Noreen under her wing and tries to help her. Noreen ends up nearly killing their dog, setting fire to her temporary living quarters, and tearing down a wall in the café. Through all of this she finds out that she is pregnant with Wesley's child. Once again Noreen picks up her belongings and disappears. Only this time she comes back.
The book takes the reader through the mind of a troubled teen who is struggling to grow up. It also reveals the troubles from the past that many older adults deal with. Together Noreen and the people she meets at the café help each other out. It also shows the true power of love and friendship.
Brooks writes the novel freely which makes it an easy read. It holds the reader's attention, and tells a powerful story at the same time. She reveals many of life's hard-learned lessons through the encounter of total strangers. This is an entertaining and influential book for early teens through adults.

Rating:
Summary: Richie's Picks: TRUE CONFESSIONS OF A HEARTLESS GIRL
Review: Noreen, who is seventeen and newly-pregnant, is a human demolition derby who has stolen her latest boyfriend's money and truck. Running away from her latest disaster, she finds herself in the small prairie town of Pembina Lake. There she becomes the catalyst for change among all the story's other impeccably drawn characters, ranging from five year-old Seth to septuagenarian Dolores. The old café in town where newly-arrived Noreen takes shelter from the storm is symbolic of the characters in Pembina Lake--they too are going to rot away and collapse if this obnoxious teenager doesn't tear at their edges as she does with the café wallpaper.

This is a remarkable story with just a couple of settings, amazing dialogue, and portraits of a small town that frequently made me shiver the way I did when first reading Steinbeck's 1930's descriptions of Salinas.

Rating:
Summary: Blah...Happy Ending... Blah .... Blah
Review: The story begins with Noreen being taken in by a cafe owner Lynda after she has a falling out with her boyfriend. After being coaxed by one of Lynda's friends, Dolores, and the whole story falls out, how Noreen didnt like here step dad and turned 'bad' so moved in with her newlywed step sister, where she still acts the same. She runs away from home with boyfriend Brandon , to return home with Wesely, where she get in a fight with her sister, to just move in with Wesely, who adores her. Well Noreen becomes bored and starts using Wesely's saved up money. They have a fight and she runs away with 700 of his dollars, his car, and his future child. And she now finds herself in the present story living in a cafe in a small town. To blinded by their ego the two split only to think about each other often while away. The two come together several times but after the third or so the two (well Noreen) realize their love for each other and everyone gets their happy ending. Im rating it three stars because this story was just so.. Boring.. The story seemed to drag on, and Noreen's heartless behavior made you want to smack her one. But hey! if you like this book,good for you, its what ever floats your boat.

Rating:
Summary: Recommended
Review: This book was heartwarming and the main character, if sometimes annoying with her "heartless" behavior, is likable. Besides Noreen though, the author has interesting, 3D suporting characters: Wesley Cuthand, Noreen's boyfriend, and the many inhabitants of the town Noreen stumbles upon at the beginning of the book.
Very much like Where The Heart Is, this book is about a stranger who walks into town one day, and changes the lives of the people who live there.

Rating:
Summary: Confessions of more than a heartless girl
Review: True Confessions of a Heartless Girlî takes readers to a hapless girlís last stop in Pembina Lake, a small village where she finds perspective on her life through the help of the local townsfolk. Most of the novel is spent not through the eyes of a 17-year-old girl, but those of the people around here. Though Noreen, the ìheartless girl,î has plenty of problems to work through, this story is also about the emotional journey of the individuals of Pembina Lake, who are middle-aged to senior citizens. In this aspect, this is a nontraditional narrative for juvenile fiction. The various inner monologues donít weigh the book down; instead they balance against the string of accidents created by Noreen. More time actually could be devoted to Noreen, who has no actual described motive for her behavior besides being a teenager. The novel could be expanded to show the impact these ten days had on Noreen. Instead, the novel had a cliff-hanger ending that left many unanswered questions.