Book overview
To friends and family, Jane seemed like a normal teen... until, she didn't...
Jane (aka Plain Jane) has always known she was different inside, and not in a good way. This has driven her to her construct her life as a solid B, for average, person and to carefully follow the rules of her high school hierarchy. But, when she undergoes her first bipolar episode and becomes acutely manic, she thumbs her nose at that hierarchy and begins a campaign to revolutionize her high school and rise up against its stifling social norms - and shake up the school she does. She becomes the most talked about student and no longer cares what anyone thinks of her as her over-the-top, comedic antics play out in public. Her mission culminates with an outrageous school presidential election speech and subsequent hospitalization.
Once Jane has come down from the mania and is released from the psychiatric hospital, she is humiliated by what she's done and descends into suicidal depression. Now she'll never fit in again. She'll forever be known as the giant freak she's always believed she was. And she's ruined a burgeoning romance with the biggest crush she's ever had. Making matters worse, she also discovers a devastating and dark secret that her absent, indifferent mother has been harboring for years.
Jane crawls her way back from the ledge and begins the healing process, but she won't return to school, where she's certain she'll be the biggest outcast ever. But, a chance encounter with a former schoolmate leads her to reassess that decision - and her whole life.
Is she truly all that different from "normal" teenagers? Did her campaign actually change her high school? Did she change lives? Is her mother the unloving narcissist she'd always believed she was?
Fans of Laurie Halse Anderson, John Green, 13 Reasons Why, All the Bright Places and It's Kind of a Funny Story will enjoy this gripping, gritty and realistic story.
