THE FAIR-WEATHER FRIENDS

Puberty is troubling, not only to the child facing adulthood but to friends who aren't themselves ready for the change. This is an amusing and affectionate novel about such a situation. Twelve-year-old Kit can't wait for summer to begin so that she and best-friend Phoebe can pick up where they left off last summer. She feels deeply betrayed when her friend comes back from a trip to Paris filled with a new sophistication and maturity. Kit cannot resist revenge, and then must live with herself after it. This is a nicely constructed story, with a pleasant setting on a Martha's Vineyard-like colony that has an active summer theater. There is a nice subplot of Kit trying to convince her little sister to let their grandmother be her true theatrical self. On a literary and emotional level that will be understood and appreciated by middle-graders, this has considerable humor to keep it from being a book ""with a lesson."" Good for both school and public library collections.