Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys. Reviewed from ARC.

I enjoyed this author's first read, Between Shades of Gray, so I was looking forward to reading this one, especially since the setting is New Orleans. Guess who spent just spent her spring break in New Orleans? This girl!

Opening line: "My mother's a prostitute."

Josie's mother doesn't want her. So Josie moves into a Royal Street bookstore in exchange for working. She's a smart girl, but can't escape her family tree. Josie's mentor is the whorehouse madam, who is trying to keep Josie clean and straight, but she doesn't want Josie to leave New Orleans.

I'm having a difficult time judging the audience for this book.Most of the time it reads very tween, but Josie is around whorehouses and lowlifes. She's not innocent, but she sees the world in a hopeful, innocent way. That's the biggest problem for me. Can a street-smart girl who carries a pistol on her leg really think that going to Smith College will change her world? Can she be that hopeful? Can she not see what kind of a man her friend Patrick is? The ending wraps up so nice and clean that it seems like a middle grade novel. And I really don't see the significance of the birdcage on the cover--did I miss something in my reading?