Brave New Wanda — Lynda Rutledge

This topical young adult book won an Illinois Arts Council award.Wanda Louise Ledbetter, -- thirteen, "white trash," orphaned, mad, and too smart for her own good -- is eyeballing every man leaving the doctor's' entrance of the big Dallas hospital. Perched on her mama''s rusted-out Cadillac, she''s been there ever since her stepfather Harley, drunk and abusive after her mother''s funeral, yelled out the secret nobody was ever supposed to know: Wanda''s daddy wasn''t her daddy, and not even her dead mama knew his name, -- because Wanda was made with donor sperm. So Wanda has grabbed her half-gone grandma and her half-dog Wild Thing and hit the road to find her "real" daddy. There''s brave new trouble ahead, and Brave New Wanda is roaring toward it.