God Is In the Pancakes, by Robin Epstein

God Is In the Pancakes, by Robin Epstein
YA, 2010

from Goodreads:
Fifteen-year-old Grace Manning is a candy striper in a nursing home, and Mr. Sands is the one patient who makes the job bearable. He keeps up with her sarcasm, teaches her to play poker . . . and one day cheerfully asks her to help him die. At first Grace says no way, but as Mr. Sands’s disease progresses, she’s not so sure. Grace tries to avoid the wrenching decision by praying for a miracle, stuffing herself with pancakes, and running away from all feelings, including the new ones she has for her best friend Eric. But Mr. Sands is getting worse, and she can’t avoid him forever.

Raspberry:
On one hand, this book has all the makings of a cliche - girl and her family abandoned by their father, tenuous relationships with that family but on the mend, best friend becoming something more...really it could have been quite predictable. And in many ways, it was. But what I love about Grace is that she is 15. Things don't just fall into place and overnight she doesn't just know what to do. She suffers through high school like many of us did - in the shadows - and secretly enjoys that her mother makes her work. She wants something more with her best friend but doesn't realize it right away. She wrestles with whether to tell her sister and her mother how she feels about things, worried she'll make things worse. And like most girls, it's funny what the perfect dress will do for your confidence. 
In the end, this isn't a breakthrough phenomenon, but it is a story that is true to itself without allowing the cliches to overcome and make it into what a lot of teen fiction (drama?!) is today. A thought-provoking book that asks (and sometimes answers) questions without whacking you in the face.
Graded a B.

Note: There is a significant amount of swearing, including one instance of the f-word.