Kathleen's Story

It's the summer after sophomore year and Raina has convinced her best friends since the sixth grade, Kathleen and Holly, to spend their summer as pink angels in Parker-Sloan General Hospital's summer volunteer program. Kathleen is reluctant to do it--she has enough responsibility at home caring for her sick mother. But when she meets Carson, a cute and flirty fellow volunteer, she is happy that she joined the program. Or, at least, she thinks she is. Carson's old friend Stephanie keeps showing up at all the wrong times. And Kathleen's mother keeps complaining that she needs Kathleen at home. But with friends Raina and Holly by her side and her Pink Angel t-shirt on her back, Kathleen is able to realize that helping others also allows you to help yourself.

Lurlene McDaniel (born 1944 in Canada, although she has lived in the U.S. for most of her life) is an author who has written over 60 young adult books. She is well-known for writing about young adults struggling with mortality and chronic illness, a career that began as a therapeutic way to deal with the trauma when her son, then 3, was diagnosed with juvenile diabetes. Her characters have grappled with cancer, diabetes, organ failure, and the deaths of loved ones through disease or suicide. She is a graduate of the University of South Florida - Tampa and currently resides in Tennessee.