A stunningly real juvenile/young adult novel about a teenager struggling with her mom's alcoholism and disappearance. Her own devolving mental health and obsessive behaviors are completely realistic and expressive. The only unrealistic part of the book was the ending, which I won't spoil for you, but it seems that things would really not end up that way in the real world. Maybe the author really wanted to end on a hopeful note?
Anyway, this is recommended for youngsters struggling with an alcoholic parent, teens who want to understand what a friend in that situation is going through, and adults who'd like more insight into the mind of a teen child of an alcoholic. ( )

Claudine wakes up and finds her mother missing. At first, she is not worried about her alcholic mother who often leaves her alone for stretches at a time and comes home after sobering up. After a few days, Claudine begins to worry. Her propensity for making lists and cleaning up become more and more serious as these rituals take over her life. Her grades drop and she distances herself from her friends as she tries to convince them that her mom has run away to rehab. Will her mother ever come home? Will Claudine cause permanent damage to herself and her relationships because of her obsessive compulsive disorder?

Cover blurb: How deep do you have to dig to bury your past?
Careful planning and constant control are Claudine's protection. Order is her weapon. She's long buried her own needs and dreams to cover for her alcoholic mom. But when Mom suddenly disappears - on another alcoholic binge? - seventeen-year-old Claudine finds herself all alone, and a much darker reality emerges from beneath years of angry denial and enabling behavior. And as the truth comes closer to the surface, Claudine must dig for the answers she's always worked so hard to cover up.

The art design for this is quite effective. The cover shows an array of post-it notes in different colours, with tasks written on them, some ordinary (call Liz, get more soda) others more unsettling (vacuum everything, eat breakfast, give rug stains another try) and a small gap where the title and a girl's eye are visible. Each chapter heading has a list of tasks, at first on torn notebook pages, then on post-its, more and more tasks each time.

I'm a bit of a sucker for kids-coping stories, whether the positive Boxcar Children style, or the darker Tillerman type. This is definitely the Tillerman end of the spectrum, though there are hints that the ending will be darker than it turns out to be.
Claude is the classic Good Kid and enabler for her mother, and the frustrated affection between them is well-portrayed, as is the slipping of her coping mechanisms as the story goes on. It didn't grip me to the extent that Homecoming or A Solitary Blue did, but it was a quick and engaging read.

Buried by Robin Merrow MacCready won the Edgar Award for Best YA in 2006, made the NYPL Best Books for Teen Age List in 2007 and won the ALA Best Books For Young Adults award in 2008.

Buried is the story of a young girl with an alcoholic mother. Throughout her life she has put aside her needs and desires to care for her mother. When her mother suddenly disappears she is forced to deal with her true feelings while trying to survive on her own.
In Buried MacCready provides readers with an in depth look into the thoughts and feelings of her main character, Claudine. Readers see the world through the young girls eyes as she struggles to maintain a good front for her friends and teachers while trying to figure out where her mother has gone. The author shows readers the dangerous world of codependency in this enlightening and suspenseful psychological thriller. I highly recommend this book for high school readers at all stages. ( )

2007 - Best Young Adult Edgar AwardIt becomes obvious what is going on about a third of the way through, but Merrow MacCready has so deftly crafted this chilling character study that I found myself unable to put it down. She has captured Claudine's journey through the trauma of alcoholism and codependency perfectly. ( )