RAIN IS NOT MY INDIAN NAME

Hearing Jenna Lamia read Cassidy Rain Berghoff's story, you can't help but feel you've known Rain your whole life--haunted the mostly white Middle-American streets of Hannesburg, Kansas, with her; soared into the dark night on a swing next to her best friend and potential kissing partner, Galen Owen; hidden behind a computer screen for most of six grief-stricken months following Galen's death; and struggled against family expectations that, as a mixed-blood Indian, she will enroll in Aunt Georgia's Indian Camp. Jenna Lamia's motherless Rain is as fresh, earnest, and appealingly impertinent as the character demands, while her secondary characters sing with individuality--from Mrs. Owen's clipped delivery to Bernadette Ray's nasal pronouncements of Rain's split ends. Rich with sorrow and the longing for resolution in a life diminished by loss, the story of Rain's journey toward her own identity is captivating and exceedingly hopeful. T.B. (c) AudioFile 2001, Portland, Maine [Published: DEC/ JAN 02]