Title: More Anger Chronicles: Freshman Year

Series: The Anger Chronicles, Book Two

Author: Jessie Preisendorfer

Publisher: NineStar Press

Release Date: 07/07/2026

Heat Level: 1 – No Sex

Pairing: Female/Female

Length: 306

Genre: Contemporary YA, contemporary, YA, bisexual, lesbian, literature/genre fiction, high school, coming out, coming of age, first time, rabbi/Jewish rituals, humorous, therapist, physical violence, anger issues/management, alcohol, strong language, family drama, theater

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Description

Shay, sarcastic and queer, is settling in with her fifth foster family in four years. The Morgensterns—Rabbi Miriam, husband Ravid, nine-year-old twins Nathan and Eli, and a big black cat—welcoming and patient, slowly adjust to life with Shay. The challenges are frequent when Shay’s always-below-the-surface anger bubbles up. Against her better judgment, she finds herself becoming more attached to them.

Conflict starts on day one of high school when Shay’s first serious girlfriend ghosts her. Things get more complicated when Shay volunteers for the school theater production and develops a crush on the girl in charge of the stage crew. Can Shay help it when she then crushes on one of the boy actors? Shay tries to navigate it all, but eventually, her anger issues cause her to make a bad decision that hurts a friend deeply.

Further complicating things, Shay’s father, released from prison the previous year, announces he wants to pursue custody. Of course, this throws Shay’s life with the Morgensterns into turmoil. Will he take her away from her friends and foster family? What’s the point of getting attached to everyone when everything can be lost?

More Anger Chronicles: Freshman Year
Jessie Preisendorfer © 2026
All Rights Reserved

I texted Wanda a picture of my hair. She video called me (who calls anyone?) to yell about the cuteness of my haircut. I was relieved. At least one person wouldn’t stare at me tomorrow. The news about Rhonda getting off my case, though, wow. It made me so happy, I didn’t even check for new posts from Toya all night. (That was a lie, but I only checked a few hundred times instead of the usual thousand times.)

My hair got zero attention when I got to school. No one said anything. That wasn’t a positive thing. If people had liked it, they would have said something. Wanda was the only one, bless her sweet soul, as my grandma used to say. Wanda said my haircut was very flattering and framed my face well, whatever the hell that meant. Wanda planned to be a stylist to the stars. She had a couple thousand followers on her Instagram page, where she gave makeup tips using products this one company sent her all the time. I followed her, of course, and liked all her posts, but didn’t really watch the videos.

I was kind of envious that Wanda already knew what she wanted to do with her life. I barely kept my day-to-day life together, and she planned to go to New York to work with models. I’d forgotten to brush my teeth that morning, but Wanda had paperwork from her school counselor that would take her to cosmetology school next year for part of the day.

“You have to come to tech school with me next year,” she kept saying. But none of the programs interested me, except for maybe culinary arts, and that was because I was always worried about being hungry. (Another perk of being a foster kid was sometimes the real kids got all the food, leaving nothing but cereal for the fosters. I ate cornflakes for a month straight once.)

The day actually didn’t suck. At lunch, we sat at the same table with the same three boys, who had accepted their fate of getting stuck with us. One of them stared at my hair a little too long.

“Say something nice or don’t say anything,” I threatened.

He choked out, “looks good,” around a mouthful of pizza and turned back to his lunch.

Charlie strolled past our table. “Nice haircut. Did you do it yourself?”

I stood up fast, which got the security guard’s attention from across the cafeteria. I smiled so that it appeared friendly from a distance. “Charlie, I chose this haircut. You chose to be an asshole. In two months, my hair will grow out, but you’ll still be an asshole. Go find your friends, if you have any.”

She took a step closer to me. The security guard started strolling toward us. I backed away, hands at my side.

“If you hit me, get my good eye. Balance it out,” I said, turning my good side toward her.

Her face was red, but she turned and stormed away, screaming, “Bitch!” at me.

People at nearby tables turned to see who the bitch was. Phones came out and were raised to begin recording.

“Lonely asshole!” I shot at her back loudly, and the people turned their faces and their cameras to see who the lonely asshole was. Charlie stopped for a moment, about to say or do something, then turned and kept walking. The phones lowered.

I sat back down. The three boys at the table stared at me, open-mouthed again.

Wanda patted me on the back. “Nice work. Why does she keep coming over here?”

“She’s a lonely asshole,” one of the boys said; we turned to him. “I’m Josh,” he said. “This is Ty, and this is also Josh.” He gestured to the other boys.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Wanda, and this is Shay.”

Josh #1 said, “Ty, here, stutters sometimes, and Charlie makes fun of him. She always has, since first grade.”

Ty dropped his head and stared at his tray.

Wanda, who was by far the kinder of the two of us, shrugged. “You can’t help stuttering. My cousin stutters. I have trouble processing stuff, and Shay does, too, in addition to having a lot of repressed anger.”

“Hey!” I interrupted, irritated.

“See?” Wanda pointed at me. “Angry.”

Josh, Josh #2, and Ty all nodded.

As we finished lunch, Wanda grilled the boys about their schedules. Apparently, the Joshes were good at math, and Ty played freshman football. I kicked Wanda under the table when she asked when the next freshman football game was.

Ty said, “Saturday afternoon.” I could see he spoke carefully so he wouldn’t stutter.

Wanda kicked me back, so I kicked her back. She texted me: stop kicking me im being nice you crank.

I responded: Stop being nice. I’m not a crank.

Her irritation with me showed when she texted back: youre right. youre not a crank. youre a lonely asshole

I replied with: Gross boy lover.

She laughed. We sent stupid cat gifs back and forth until lunch ended.

When the bell rang, Wanda waved at the boys. “See you tomorrow.”

They stared at her. One of the Joshes—or maybe Ty—nodded and waved.

“They’ve never had a girl say that to them before,” I said.

Wanda said, “Probably not, poor things.”

 

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Jessie has been performing comedy in her spare time for over twenty-five years, which definitely comes in handy during the day in her job as a high school teacher. She grew up in the Poconos, in a house in the woods on a lake, with very little parental oversight. It was even more dangerous than it sounds, but it was the ’70s. Jessie is a lifelong writer, and with her first novel, she is eager to contribute to the queer YA subgenre. Jessie lives outside Philadelphia with her wife, two cats, and fantasies of days spent volunteering at goat rescues after she retires. Find Jessie on Facebook.