The Truth About Delilah Blue by Tish Cohen

In The Truth About Delilah Blue, Delilah, or Lila (the name she goes by now), models in the nude for art students as a way to earn money for art school. In the meantime, she listens to every word the teacher says trying to pick up what she can. She lives with her father, who showing early signs of Alzheimer's. When she was eight, her father moved the two of them to California stating that her mother no longer wanted to care for Delilah. Now with her mother back in the picture, she's caught between her parents while she tries to find out the real reason her father took her away.

Great book! It contains a really good story line, which was executed beautifully, and plenty of likeable and believable characters. I enjoyed reading all of the art related material and was surprised to learn that the models could/would dictate the poses. I always assumed it was the artist or in this case the teacher who directed the model. I especially loved how Cohen introduced past events in the book. As the secrets were revealed, they are linked back to events earlier in Delilah's life, slowly filling in the pieces to the puzzle. I liked that the text of these events were set apart from the present day with a date and italics. That made it very easy to follow what was going on.

I knew Delilah was going to be reunited with her mother at some point. I was expecting this movie-type scene with huge drama. But it didn't happen that way. It's funny because I was thinking afterwards that Cohen's portrayal of the event was probably more like real life, where my vision was just Hollywood fiction. The book became real for me after that.

Delilah was a great character, but I really felt sorry for her. Caught in the middle between her parents, she was still very protective of her father even though she no longer fully trusted him. She wanted the truth and needed to act quickly before he lost his memory. However, she didn't want to upset him and make his condition worse. Delilah was also very leery of her mother, who had abandoned her all those years ago, or so she thought. Whom could she trust?

There were two other characters that I enjoyed reading about: Kieran and Lichty. Kieran, Delilah's much younger half sister, was hilarious. Other characters called her uptight and felt sorry for her because she was losing out on her childhood. I liked her because she added comic relief to the story and had some pretty funny lines. Lichty, Delilah's art teacher, who had his nose in the air and verbally tortured poor Delilah. I couldn't wait to see what he was going to do or say next.

Highly recommended. I have Inside Out Girl on my to-be-read bookshelf. I'm looking forward to reading it.

For more information about this book or to browse inside, please visit the HarperCollins Canada website.

For more information about the author and her other books, please visit Tish Cohen's website.

I'd like to thank those nice people at HarperCollins Canada for this review copy.

The Truth About Delilah Blue by Tish Cohen, HarperCollins, ©2010. ISBN 9781554685868(Trade paperback), 409p.