Me, Him, Them, and It

by Caela Carter

Overview

ME: Evelyn, closeted good girl turned bad.
HIM: Todd, her supposed Friend with Benefits.
THEM: Her cold, distant parents.
IT: The baby that's growing inside her.

When Evelyn decided to piss off her parents with a bad reputation, she wasn't planning to ruin her valedictorian status. She also wasn't planning to fall for Todd-the guy she was just using for sex. And she definitely wasn't planning on getting pregnant. When Todd turns his back on her, Evelyn's not sure where to go. Can a distant mother, a cheating father, an angry best friend, and a (thankfully) loving aunt with adopted daughters of her own help Evelyn make the heart-wrenching decisions that follow?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781619630093
Publisher:	Bloomsbury USA
Publication date:	02/26/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
File size:	3 MB
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

CAELA CARTER is also the author of My Best Friend, Maybe. She spent eight years working in middle and high schools as a teacher and a librarian. A graduate of The New School's MFA program, she also writes for Teen Writers Bloc, a blog on children's literature. She lives in New York with her husband.
www.caelacarter.com
@CaelaCarter

CAELA CARTER is the author of Me, Him, Them, and It. She's also a student at the New School's MFA program, concentrating in writing for children. Currently a middle school librarian, she spent six years teaching, and one summer educating and counseling young mothers and pregnant teenagers. She also writes for Teen Writers Bloc, a blog on children's literature.

Editorial Reviews

In this introspective first novel, Carter persuasively traces the vacillating emotions and opinions of a distraught pregnant teenager, showing how a 16-year-old mother-to-be finds the support and courage she needs to make necessary choices. Evelyn knows she has options, but she can’t imagine carrying out any of them; she’s at the top of her class, has Ivy League aspirations, and—more than anything—just doesn’t want to be pregnant. At her parents’ suggestion, Evelyn seeks temporary refuge with her aunt’s unconventional family in Chicago, but she soon realizes that hiding from her friends and the nuns at her Catholic school back home won’t make her problems disappear. She also has to face hard truths about her parents’ failing marriage, her best friend’s anger at being kept in the dark, and the father’s unwillingness to take responsibility for the unborn child. Carter doesn’t sugarcoat the pain and complications that result from Evelyn’s choice. If anything, readers are left to ponder whether there are such things as “right” decisions for girls in Evelyn’s situation. Ages 14–up. Agent: Kate McKean, Howard Morhaim Literary Agency. (Feb.)

Publishers Weekly

“Evie . . . is the wisest, funniest, most conflicted narrator since Juno. Me, Him, Them, and It ought to be assigned alongside The Scarlet Letter.” —Patricia McCormick, National Book Award finalist and bestselling author

“Caela Carter paints a raw and unflinching picture of the truth about teen pregnancy--a truth every teen should know . . . Readers looking for a bold and gripping addition to their bookshelf will not be disappointed--and will not be able to put this book down.” —Jennifer Brown, author of Hate List and Bitter End

“Deftly captures the emotional complexities of teenage pregnancy . . . For readers looking for genres that express the stark realities of life with all their highs and lows, this book will be one to recommend.” —VOYA

“Breathtaking, brutal, and beautifully real, Carter's debut is stunning.” —Romantic Times

From the Publisher

Does a good girl truly go bad if nobody notices? In an effort to get her silently feuding parents to pay attention (Dad had an affair, but for Evelyn's sake has "reconciled" with her mother and moved back home), Evelyn resorts to trashing her reputation. She drops track, begins partying in earnest, and sleeps, repeatedly, with Todd. However, with her grades still deliberately intact, Evelyn's parents are oblivious. So when Evelyn's un-boyfriend Todd (amazingly, no one at her small, Catholic high school even knows they are together), turns up one night sans protection, Evelyn concurs. One night leads to multiple other protection-free nights and lo and behold, Evelyn turns up pregnant. The story turns on Evelyn's inability to make any decision regarding her pregnancy; she drags her mother to the Planned Parenthood clinic staffer to break the news and is completely incapable of seriously considering the plethora of options which now face her. Attorney mom takes charge, arranging for Evelyn to leave Florida and stay with her "sick" aunt for the remainder of the school year. Barely speaking to Todd, she joins Aunt Linda and Aunt Nora and their two adopted African-American kids in Chicago to ride out the pregnancy. At turns extraordinarily annoying and heartbreakingly insightful, Evelyn struggles with her options, with letting people help her and finally, with coming to grips with her decisions and their myriad of consequences. While Evelyn is incredibly self-centered (but what teen isn't?), credit is due for the honest portrayal of her mixed-up emotions and for presenting a balanced approach to the struggles and questions a pregnant teen must face. Things wrap up a bit too neatly, and the book isn't the strongest of its genre, but it may well resonate with teens facing—or know friends who face—similar circumstances. Reviewer: Kris Sauer

Children's Literature - Kris Sauer

Gr 9 Up—Accomplished at cross-country, art, and academics, 16-year-old Evelyn, who attends a Catholic school in Jacksonville, Florida, downs ginger ale and hard-to-hear advice, both handed to her by Mary at Planned Parenthood. When life with her parents got too silent and miserable following her dad's return home after leaving for another woman, Evelyn decided to leave her good-girl image behind and sleep with a football player who really seemed to like her. Todd never actually becomes her boyfriend, and their relationship stays on the "down-low." Soon Evelyn finds herself pregnant with no good options and no real help from him. She doesn't even want to tell her best friend about the decisions she is facing, let alone think about attending school while she swells to smuggling-a-basketball proportions, but she can't do this alone. While Bean grows inside her, Evelyn learns how to talk, to take risks, and to forgive. Characters feel true, and the pregnancy time line helps propel readers through a difficult but rewarding journey as Evelyn's life utterly transforms. A poignant tale that is likely to appeal even to reluctant readers.—Suzanne Gordon, Lanier High School, Sugar Hill, GA

School Library Journal

A "good girl" experiences an unplanned pregnancy and its aftermath. Evelyn is a classic good girl, earning top grades and excelling in the art studio as well as on the track. When her parents start paying more attention to their acrimoniously crumbling marriage than to their daughter, she punishes them by becoming drinking, drugging, sex-having Bad Evelyn. Unfortunately, Bad Evelyn's exploits become a punishment for her, too, as her protection-free sex with Todd leads to an unplanned pregnancy. Evelyn's situation is the stuff of classic YA problem novels: What will she do about her pregnancy? How will she live with her choices? Will her heart, in fact, go on? Fearing expulsion from her competitive and deeply conservative Catholic high school, Evelyn relocates to Chicago to live with her aunts Linda and Nora and their daughters while she makes her choices and protects her GPA. Evelyn is a tough nut to crack, and she's not particularly likable, but through all her self-contradictory crabbiness and emotionally withholding fears, readers may see someone recognizably real. First-time author Carter drags her narrative out, making readers angst along with Evelyn as she chronicles every week of her pregnancy and beyond. Readers who relish self-indulgent inner monologue and expect dramatic arguments, seething resentment, tearful heartbreak, unspoken anxieties, unexpected friendships and ultimately, graceful reconciliation, will not be disappointed. (Fiction. 14-16)

Kirkus Reviews