Hello, My Name Is Emily Enhances Goddard's Standing in the Young-Adult Literary Field

Joy Lynn Goddard doesn't shy away from the tough stuff. She doesn't pull her punches. She doesn't pretend that the life of a young teenager is all sugar and spice and nicey-nice.

(PRWEB) April 30, 2008 -- Joy Lynn Goddard doesn't shy away from the tough stuff. She doesn't pull her punches. She doesn't pretend that the life of a young teenager is all sugar and spice and nicey-nice.

That's why she has developed a well-deserved reputation as one of Canada's top authors of novels aimed at the young, coming-of-age adult. Her first two works, Daredevils and Charlie's Song, were well conceived and very well received -- and now, with the publication and commercial release of Hello, My Name Is Emily, Goddard has advanced her standing as a writer very much worth reading.

Goddard is a teacher, based in Guelph, Ontario, and what she brings to the literary table is realism -- portraits of realistic young teens, living a realistic, complicated life, within the form of a realistic structure of family and friends.

Emily is a young high school student. Both she and her younger brother, Taylor, were adopted -- and they've always known that. One day, her adoptive Mom and Dad -- Heather and David -- sit the kids down to break some amazing news: there's a baby on the way. This sets off a string of circumstances and events that leads Emily to begin a search for her birth mother. As she walks down that path, she hits a series of dead-ends, but then suddenly finds herself the recipient of an e-mail from an unknown man.

She knows she shouldn't enter the dangerous cyber-space world -- and her best buddy Alex tells her so -- but Emily cannot let the opportunity to find her natural mother pass by. She winds up in trouble and Alex desperately tries to save her.

What sets Hello, My Name Is Emily apart from the young-adult literary mainstream is the genuine value it holds for teen readers. Emily is a real young adult, with real young-adult problems. Her Dad drinks too much when times are tough. Her Mom is a bit of a control freak. Her little brother bugs her. Her one-time best friend Lizzie is suddenly besotted with boys. Her best boy buddy, Alex, has problems of his own on the hockey rink. And Emily's sudden infatuation with the Internet leads her to connect with a criminal, which puts young Emily very much in harm's way.

Emily's story is told clearly and directly -- and the positive life messages that emerge from the tale are presented subtly, yet powerfully. Hello, My Name Is Emily is a novel that young adults will very much enjoy -- with the full stamp of parental approval.

Hello, My Name Is Emily
by Joy Lynn Goddard
Published by: Chestnut Publishing
ISBN: 9780973621624
$14.95

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