THE LUCKY ONES

The prevailing sensibility in this relic of a novel hearkens back to a simpler time, perhaps mid-20th century, when young girls knew the difference between a magnum of champagne and a regular old bottle, Mom wore pearls, everyone on the island went to the club and Grandfather’s kindly African-American cook was named Sheba. Cecile, age 12, is critical of older sister Natalie, who at 14 and with Mom’s encouragement is having her first experience in the back seat of a car. Cecile thinks it is all too absurd, until the end when she rises to her sister’s defense, agreeing that it is terribly unfair for girls but not boys to be judged “fast.” In the end, Cecile agrees to take tennis lessons but, ever the rebel, draws the line at golf. Cecile’s proto-feminist coming-of-age takes place against a backdrop almost entirely alien to most 21st-century readers and with nary a hint of irony to balance sentences such as, “Maybe that was what made an expensive dress worth paying for: knowing you looked great in it made you feel relaxed.” (Historical fiction. 10-14)