How to Tell a True Story - by Tricia Springstubb (Hardcover)

About the Book

"After 7th grader Amber Price's secretive older brother rescues her from a devastating house fire, the community's response proves that kindness is as complicated as family"--

Book Synopsis

After seventh grader Amber's secretive older brother rescues her from a devastating house fire, the community's response proves that kindness is as complicated as family in this novel for younger YA readers.

There's nothing very special about Amber Price. She's not a star student, athlete or artist, and definitely not one of the popular kids. Her crush hardly knows she exists. At least, that's her life before. Before a fire destroys her home, before her older teenage brother Gage saves her life, before her classmates rally to stage a fundraiser, The Price of Kindness, for her family. Suddenly, Gage who was hurt in the fire is a famous hero and Amber is the center of attention at school. Everyone wants to help, everyone wants to be kind, everyone wants to tell her story.

As Amber enjoys her new popularity, she keeps her worries to herself. Her parents are arguing more than ever, and her father has moved into an apartment while the rest of them stay with Amber's aunt. And why, after he risked his life for her, is Gage keeping secrets from her? Then just days before her family will be honored in a special Price of Kindness presentation at school, she discovers how the fire started and faces huge moral question: Is it wrong to tell lies to save yourself and those you love?

The Most Perfect Thing in the Universe author Tricia Springstubb poignantly explores the way disasters impact family and community, painting a tender portrait of resilience and empathy in this young YA novel.

A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection

Review Quotes

A sincere and humane narrative that probes human complexity.
--Kirkus Reviews

This thoughtful portrayal of a preteen navigating postcatastrophe life by Springstubb offers a quietly suspenseful exploration of morality.
--Publishers Weekly

Late middle-school and early high-school readers will devour this quickly and, possibly, learn something about the value of telling the truth.
--Booklist

Amber and her friends are portrayed realistically as teens with typical cliques, social anxieties, and dynamics of middle school groups. Her family is well defined and instantly relatable. The theme that everyone deserves kindness is not heavy-handed but develops through the ­interactions of students, ­family, and teachers, reminding readers that ­everyone ­carries their own unseen struggles.
--School Library Journal

There is a lovely and nuanced reality to how Amber and the people in her life deal with the tragedy, which causes some relationships to become closer and some to fall apart as she learns the difficult lesson that truth is often "as confusing as people, who could be good and bad, kind and selfish, brave and weak, familiar and changing, all rolled into one."
--Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

About the Author

Tricia Springstubb has written many well-reviewed books for young readers, including Looking for True, The Most Perfect Thing in the Universe, and What Happened on Fox Street, which was an Indie Pick. She also wrote Every Single Second which received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Kirkus Reviews. She lives in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.