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Putting Makeup on Dead People

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Putting Makeup on Dead People

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Overview

Since her father's death four years ago, Donna has gone through the motions of living: her friendships are empty, she's clueless about what to do after high school graduation, and her grief keeps her isolated, cut off even from the one parent she has left. That is until she's standing in front of the dead body of a classmate at Brighton Brothers' Funeral Home. At that moment, Donna realizes what might just give her life purpose is comforting others in death.

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About the Author

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781423153139
Publisher:	Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	05/24/2011
Sold by:	Hachette Digital, Inc.
Format:	eBook
File size:	786 KB
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

Born and raised in Pittsburgh, PA, Jen Violi has now staked her claim in Portland, Oregon, where the greenery is plentiful, the creative spirit palpable, and the fresh coffee available every few feet-just how she likes it. Thanks to the Universities of Dayton and New Orleans, Jen got to study English, theatre, theology, and creative writing. With reverence for the healing power of stories, Jen runs her own business, offering creative writing coaching, workshops, and retreats.

Visit the author's website at www.jenvioli.com.

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Editorial Reviews

Since Donna's father died, she prefers to go inside herself to a "quiet place.... the only spot I feel at home," until she finds another comfortable place—a funeral home—and decides to become a mortician. But even as Donna applies to mortuary school after high school and starts work at Brighton Brothers Funeral Home, she must learn to connect with the living, including her well-meaning but disapproving mother and an offbeat friend who may be crushing on her. Readers will find Donna's job choice intriguing, as well as the descriptions of her education, including restorative arts class, where "people in lab coats are working with what I think is clay, shaping it into things I have to squint to realize are parts of the human face." Violi's first novel is swimming in unusual characters, from the people—both living and dead—who pass through the funeral home, to the eccentric members of Donna's church drama troupe. These characters and their many plot lines distract from Donna's journey to embrace both those around her and those who have died. Ages 14–up. (May)

Publishers Weekly

Here's a teen novel with a unique premise: High-school senior Donna decides she wants to become a mortician.
Donna has experience with death. Her beloved father died of cancer when she was 14, and she's had some trouble relating to others since that event. When a classmate dies in an accident, Donna attends the viewing in the same funeral home that her family had used for her father, and she becomes fascinated by the procedures there. How do they get the makeup so right? She finds that the corpses do not frighten her. The mortuary feels like home. Against her mother's strongly expressed wishes, she decides to go to mortician's school instead of the Catholic college that has already accepted her. As she rebels against her mother, she meets a boy who seems interested in her and starts a relationship based mostly on sexual attraction, leaving her secret crush on another boy unfulfilled. Meanwhile she moves in to the "student's room" at the mortuary, confidently awaiting her embalming class. Although some wry comedy seeps into the narrative, Donna's focus, and the book's, remains on respecting the dead people and easing the grief of their families. As Donna learns how to care for dead people she also begins to care for living ones.
A book that looks at death and reveals much about life. (Fiction. 12 & up)

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