Preview of Second Star to the Right Summary:

Second Star to the Right is about the complex love between a parent and a child. In an age when most books for the young adult are focusing on aspects of an abused or neglected child, this book shows what happens when the love of a mother becomes too encompassing. Leslie Hiller loves her mother, but she never seems to be able to enjoy that love; instead, she always feels guilty for something she has thought about or for something she has not thought to do. Leslie and her mother love each other "to the moon and back," but this love leaves Leslie empty and guilty.

Leslie is always trying to figure out what will make her happy, while at the same time keeping her image as the perfect child intact for her mother's friends. She is a fourteen-year-old girl who says that she loves to break rules...