Synopsis
"It's going to be one of the most exciting summers of our lives," Pamela tells Alice and Elizabeth. The important thing this summer before high school is to create a perfect body. But for each of the girls it is, instead, a summer of growing up on the inside, rather than outside. Elizabeth discovers that to always accept others' opinions is a mistake. Pamela learns since her mother ran away that she must live with her family problems. And Alice slowly realizes that she does not have all the answers to the problems life brings her and that her decisions can affect other people in good ways or bad. The summer is a memorable one, but not in the way the girls had planned. They come to September more mature, if not more physically beautiful.
KLIATT
The summer before high school Alice and her friends Pamela and Elizabeth decide they need to shape up, so they go on a diet and start running every morning. Elizabeth takes it to extremes and starts to get too thin. Her mother treats the three girls to a special seminar at the Y for girls only in which they get a day's worth of straight talk about nutrition, body shapes and sizes, and some graphic lessons about how body parts vary tremendously from one person to another and that all the variations are normal. Alice's older brother Lester is dating a thin, beautifully groomed young woman and Alice doesn't feel comfortable around her—it turns out that Lester doesn't either. Pamela has some problems living with her ever-critical father now that her mother has run off to Colorado to start a new life. Alice has work as a volunteer at the local hospital, where she re-connects with her beloved 6th grade teacher, but unfortunately the teacher is seriously ill. Alice is growing up, slowly but surely, as are her friends. And her legion of fans will eat up this installment, as Naylor takes Alice from one joy, one sorrow, to another. This series is so superior to any other for middle-school-aged girls—with intelligent, thoughtful characters and frank, totally believable situations. At the end of the summer (and this book) Alice's father announces that he and Miss Summers will marry in the next year, so Alice's story will continue to evolve and her life will be full of changes that she will face with her usual enthusiasm and curiosity. KLIATT Codes: J—Recommended for junior high school students. 2000, Simon & Schuster/Atheneum, 215p, 99-32184, $16.00. Ages 13 to 15. Reviewer:Claire Rosser; July 2000 (Vol. 34 No. 4)