TWELVE-YEAR-OLD VOWS REVENGE!

The fourth book about the ""Life and Times of the Kids from New Eden"" follows Claire Van Kemp and Shirley Garfield's escalating feud in chapters that alternate their points of view. Claire's hopes for the summer are dashed when her uncle sends back the video games she's been managing in a comer of his hardware store in favor of more cost-effective lawn furniture. Humiliated, since she's been telling her classmates (mendaciously) that the video business is booming, Claire tangles with another entrepreneurial venture based on manipulating the truth: archrival Shirley is writing a successful journal in which--in a delightful parody of the tabloid press--she sensationalizes the most commonplace local events. Finally, after Claire starts a retaliatory rag, Shirley drags her to court (presided over by her own father, who is a judge); with laudable presence of mind, Judge Van Kemp declares both guilty on all counts and sentences them to jail until they apologize. Although not long on plausibility (the concluding turnaround, especially, is abrupt) and though the girls' vendetta merely continues without really developing, the action and badinage here are lively, while the point about troth in journalism--and in real life--is made with perspicacity and good humor. An entertaining caper.