May 1, 2009
Grades 9-12 This twenty-fourth title in the popular Alice series will grab readers with the contemporary coming-of-age story of friendship, family, love, sex, loyalty, faith, work, and loss. Alice, 17, serves as a bridesmaid at her cousins wedding (and enjoys the wild, sometimes raunchy, bachelorette party), volunteers with her friends at a homeless shelter, visits her boyfriend in his college dorm (she packs condoms but does not use them), and much more.At the storys climax, atragic loss makes Alice confront what she believes. As candid, funny, and touching as the rest of the series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)
July 1, 2009
In this twenty-fourth series entry, Alice hatches a plan to visit Patrick--overnight; Naylor gets Alice's nervous/excited anticipation about the event just right. The author packs a lot of issues into the rest of Alice's summer: volunteering at a soup kitchen, encountering a born-again Christian's zealotry, and, finally, trying to make sense of a senseless tragedy. Hopefully, senior year will be less hectic.
(Copyright 2009 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)
July 1, 2009
This twenty-fourth entry in the series sees Alice McKinley through the summer between her junior and senior years of high school. As usual, she's working at the Melody Inn and hanging out at Mark Stedmeister's pool; luckily, her cousin's wedding in Chicago gives her something to look forward to -- and not just because she's a last-minute replacement for one of the bridesmaids (bachelorette party!!). Patrick, Alice's longtime boyfriend, is taking classes at the University of Chicago, and she hatches a plan to visit him -- overnight -- while she's in town. Naylor gets Alice's nervous/excited anticipation about the night just right (as well as Patrick's cluelessness about Alice's plans), but faithful readers, for whom Alice's thoughts on sexuality have served as a guide to their own, may feel abandoned the morning after: Patrick and Alice don't have intercourse, but they are more intimate than they've ever been (as intimate as they can get, really, with pants unzipped on a park bench); later, Alice and Naylor are both uncharacteristically reticent and unreflective about what happened. Instead, the author packs a lot of issues into the rest of Alice's summer break: volunteering at a soup kitchen, encountering a born-again Christian's unquestioning zealotry, and, finally, trying to make sense of a senseless tragedy. Hopefully, senior year will be less hectic.
(Copyright 2009 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)