Big Girl Small is a novel for mothers and daughters of all ages, for every girl who is, was, or will ever be a teenager. Everybody needs a friend like Judy. She is whip-smart, hilarious, and her story is so real. She's a wonderful singer, full of big dreams for a big future-and she's a dwarf. But why is she hiding out in a seedy motel on the edge of town? Who are her friends? And why can't she face her family?

Rachel DeWoskin has written an authentic crossover voice that is up there with Curtis Sittenfeld's Prep. Big Girl Small is a gut-wrenching teen-tragedy told with laugh-out-loud humour. Every reader will recognise the anxiety of trying to be different, to be the same, to find out who you are and what your hormones are doing, and what you might want to do in the future. Most of us don't really know, and this brave novel shows us that's just fine.

'Big Girl Small is the most engaging novel I've read in many years. DeWoskin has aimed the book at all the pleasure centers: it's sad, funny, quirkily suspenseful.' Darin Strauss, author of More Than It Hurts You