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Sep 26, 2013
Anais Hendricks is a 15 year old drug fiend who pulls other girls' hair and beats them to within an inch of their lives. She juggles girlfriends and boyfriends and wears a treasured Indian headdress while prancing around in her undies on acid. She's Trouble with a capital T and that rhymes with P and that stands for Panopticon, kids! When Anais lands herself in a group home for problem teens with a spooky watchtower a strict open-door policy, the novel's dystopic vibe kicks into high gear and we watch as her layers are peeled back and reality dissolves around her. It's Scottish poet Jenni Fagan's first novel, and she makes dirty-mouthed teenagers sound more profound than Homeric bards. With Anais she's created my favorite kind of heroine — a bad girl in a worse place who claws her way out by her own off-kilter code of honor.