Good afternoon everyone and welcome to another edition of The Avid Reader. Today our guest is Meghan MacLean Weir, author of The Book of Essie published just last month by Knopf. Meghan’s memoir Between Expectations: Lessons From A Pediatric Residency chronicles her years in training at Boston Medical Center and Boston Children’s Hospital. She still works as a physician and continues to write as well. The Book Of Essie is her first novel.

Essie is a teenager whose entire life has been documented daily by cameras which record most of her life. Her Father and Mother as well as her five siblings are the stars of a reality show, not unlike the reality shows that are pervasive on our televisions today.

Six For Hicks documents the lives of a seemingly, shiny wholesome family, centered around the Father’s gigantic ministry and his flock and the corollary activities of her ruthless and calculating Mother.

But all of a sudden, a complication. Essie is pregnant, and by whom? The production team suggests an abortion, which would otherwise be anathema to the ministry and all it stands for, or a pregnancy hidden away and then the baby disposed of to another family. Both options are risky. They could be found out.

So marriage is the option they choose. Essie who has a plan in mind, choose Roarke Richards, a senior at her high school, a boy who wants out of his situation as much as Essie does. Once the wedding is planned, Essie enlists reporter Liberty Bell, who has her own issues.

Then the fun really begins. Told in the first person in alternating paragraphs by the three protagonists, we follow along breathless as we weave through this mixture of the Duggars, The Truman Show and The Hunger Games.

It’s a great adventure and a kind of morality play given the political and social situation in which we find ourselves in today’s America.