Looking for Alibrandi by Melina Marchetta

It's a year of change in the life of Josie Alibrandi, on the outside she could be any girl: she's reasonably popular at her private catholic school - even if she is on an scholarship - and she has good friends; but if you look closer she's being pulled in all directions, caught between her Italian family - mostly her single mother Christina and her grandmother Katia - and the everyday Australian culture.

She wants to belong yet she doesn't know where she belongs to. And then the father she has never know - and who doesn't really know about her - shows up; and she finds herself between two boys, one who wants to be friends and one who may want to be more than that.

And then her Grandmother Katia, whom she loves but sort of dislikes at times, begins to tell her a story, one that could explain more than Josie could imagine at first.

What can I say, I love this book. It doesn't matter that I've never been to Australia or that I don't have even an ounce of Italian heritage, I still could find my way to relate to Josie and feel for her and what she was going through, good things and bad.

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