When Monalisa Kent was six years old, she accidentally burned down the futon factory which employed most of the townspeople including her father. In the ten years that have elapsed apparently the townspeople still hate her for this accident even though they have recovered economically by focusing on the university and its students and providing endless fast food joints. Every year the local TV station does a profile of the fire and the heroics of Mac Kent, Mona’s dad who saved Mona and her best friend Paco Glenn from the raging inferno and who hasn’t been the same since his wife’s death. Mona also collects bumper stickers which lead to her gaining attention in a whole new way when she stands on the table of a local fast food restaurant and shouts out a bumper sticker slogan leading to random poetry raids around town. This implausible plotline coupled with a series of quirky characters providing subplots to the tale but with no real discernable narrative thread make this book a tedious and repetitious read.