When an unexpected visitor threatens to take away everything Jamie has ever wanted, she has to decide how far she is willing to go to make sure that what belongs to her stays hers.
From the hand-dipped caramel apples to the giant tower of pumpkins, Jamie loves everything about her family’s pumpkin patch. But her two favorite things about the Patch are the thought of becoming the next Pumpkin Princess and Danny, her father’s hard-working and crush-worthy farmhand. Everything changes when Milan, Jamie’s Hollywood starlet cousin, comes to live with the family. Soon Jamie’s mother is cooking vegetarian dinners, her father is considering selling pumpkin lattes at the Patch and Danny seems to be star-struck. Milan’s announcement that she is going to run for Pumpkin Princess is the last straw. Unusual details, such as bizarre caramel-apple concoctions and the teenagers’ habit of chucking corn at people while they are cruising, are bright lights in an otherwise dim narrative. Stock characters, a predictable plot and unimaginative dialogue combine to create a flat story that is both overfamiliar and completely forgettable.
Readers looking for a serving of small-town life with a side of royal quirkiness would do well to look elsewhere. (Fiction. 12-15)
