The Baby

Gr 8 Up—Nicola gives birth to a baby girl on the bathroom floor at her best friend Olivia's 17th birthday party without even knowing she was pregnant. Nicola's life is changed, and she must abandon her fashion designer dreams, leaving school and embarking upon single parenthood. Rifts come between friends as the father of Eliza, Nicola's baby, is Olivia's boyfriend, Jonty. The only consistency in Nicola's life is her gay friend Ben, who attempts to reunite Nicola and Olivia. Olivia's younger, socially inept sister, Alice, is also a narrator and helps with Eliza but doesn't add much to the plot. Each section is told from the perspective of a different character for a month, providing nuance as well as confusion. The third-person near stream of consciousness narration can be insightful but also veers strongly toward incomplete sentences and muddled writing. Issues of teenage pregnancy, domestic abuse, and sex are skirted more than confronted, while the alcohol flows freely for all the teens throughout. An unnecessary twist at the end adds to the lack of realism and detracts from the overall story line.