Tell Me Three Things by Julie Buxbaum Grades 10+ 352 pages Ember March 2017 Paperback     Jessie is a popular girl in her Chicago high school and, like most teens, is looking forward to returning in the fall for her junior year. Then, in just a few months, everything changes. Jessie’s mother dies, and her father dips into a depression. Without warning, he meets someone on a dating site and marries her. Now Jessie is torn from her school, facing life without her mother and forced to move to Los Angeles to attend a fancy prep school where she is a nobody. She is starting over with no friends and no knowledge of how to fit into this new school at a time when fitting in is all-important. Enter Jessie’s new pen pal, Somebody/Nobody. The email comes in just when Jessie is planning how to get back to Chicago. The sender only identifies himself/herself as somebody/nobody and a fellow student at the school. The sender is offering to lead Jessie through the difficulties of fitting into this new school--things like who to make friends with, who to avoid, what side of the cafeteria to sit on, and what to wear, eat, and say in order not to be noticed too much. Jessie is a little suspicious of this new friend, but she knows that she does need help so she begins to trust S/N--then she slowly begins to depend on S/N. Jessie can’t help wanting to identify S/N but fails at every turn. Slowly, their relationship becomes more than just a keyboard game, but she relies on S/N to build her confidence and get to who she really is at heart. Author Buxbaum has written adult novels that have been translated into 25 languages but this is her first effort on a young adult novel. She has written an honest tale of the angst of young adults and the joy of young love. Readers will be waiting for her next teen novel. This reviewer is in her seventh decade and couldn’t put this one down until she knew who S/N was.     web reviews   Joyce Rice/2017 for curled up with a good kid's book   For grown-up fiction, nonfiction and speculative fiction book reviews, visit our sister site Curled Up With a Good Book (www.curledup.com)