Poor Maisie. She was touched (or was she) by her two (or three) former male best friends in the back of the bus. She relives this experience over and over throughout the book to the point that she isn't sure exactly what really happened.

Her sitcom stepmom really gets into the court case against the school board she and her lawyer friend are building, but doesn't offer Maisie the kind of support she really needs.

Her therapist does the best she can, but Maisie doesn't totally trust her.

Her father hasn't a clue about how to relate to his daughter now that she's becoming a woman.

Although I thought this book was going somewhere in the beginning, it kept repeating the same thoughts and feelings over and over. It soon became a bit tiresome, so that when the big reveal came about what really happened, it seemed a bit anticlimactic.

I received this book in a Goodreads Giveaway.

Maisie’s best friends are three boys – Chris, Kevin, and Shakes – and they’ve been inseparable since preschool. Maisie’s family, though, has been chopped up – her divorced parents have both remarried awful, self-absorbed people, but her friends have always been there for her. Until the strange summer Maisie develops breasts. Then her friends stop being friends and start being...boys, and Maisie doesn’t know is this is good or bad – maybe it’s both. It’s definitely confusing, and tragic. Easy read, 262 pp. ( )

Maisie had 3 BFFs since preschool, and they happened to be boys. They used to be really tight until returned from a year-long visit with her mother sporting D-cup breasts. Maisie was no longer a kid, and neither were her 3 male buddies. Confusion, raging hormones, and peer pressure cause a rift in their friendships. It becomes wider when Maisie becomes more than just friends with Shakes, one fourth of her crew. The two other boys feel left out, and take their revenge by forcing Maisie to allow them to grope her boobs. In hopes of reconcilition, Maisie agrees and then things get out of hand. Was the touch consensual or was it molestation. Maisie, who is more confused about the events then she lets on, is not even sure of the real truth which comes out at the end.

This book is a tight and quick read. Like Lessons from a Dead Girl, it forces the readers into an uncomfortable place really quickly: is it still abouse if a teen's confusion about sex and sexuality leads them to consent? ( )

Teen fiction. It was a good, fast read--practically every chapter is a cliff hanger, with the reader left wanting to know exactly what did happen at the back of the bus, and what will happen to Maisie afterwards--but after a while I got tired of having these unknowns left dangling so often and for so long. ( )

He said/she said situations can become emotionally and socially complex especially when they are of a sexual nature. The author very effectively describes how complicated and confusing Maisie's life becomes after her three best male friends paw her chest one morning on the school bus. She loses their friendships and becomes ostraciized at school. She sees a therapist but can't make complete sense of what happened. Her feminist stepmother is on a mission to fight for Maisie's rights yet Maisie herself is indifferent. The feelings of loss and confusion and the teenage inability to fully express oneself are described realistically. As a book group title, it is sure to generate intense discussion. ( )