LADY ELLEN GRAE

by Vera & Bill Cleaver ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 9, 1968

When last seen (1967, p. 9, J-117), Ellen Grae seemed to have been forced to betray her own integrity, and the book was, to some, a questionable juvenile on that account. She's still ""uninhibited"" here still telling tall stories and admiring gravestones and going fishing with Grover--but not for long. Jim and Grace (mother and father, divorced but not incompatible) decide it's time she be tamed and acquire ""big values"" by living with Aunt Eleanor and cousin Laura in Seattle--which seems like Siberia to Ellen Grae. Her father's not dissuaded by a purported ""personality transference"" with visiting ladylike Laura, and Ellen Grae, feeling ""not my own person any more. . . and afraid, "" is off to Seattle carrying Grover's gift of Florida dirt and a new garter belt. She staggers through an earthquake, meets her peers in Smith Smith the Seventh and his sister Victoria, deliberately lets the boom of their boat crack her on the head (to the disgust of her parents who spot the trick to get home), finally reconciles herself ""to that which I had mastered,"" only to be brought back by her father. ""You and Grace and I are a family (even though) we don't live together,"" he explains. ""And life is precarious."" In her own words and the responses of others. Ellen Grae changes without losing perspective. Once or twice this approaches familiar tomboy face; mostly it's more than real.

Pub Date: Sept. 9, 1968

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Lippincott

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1968

Categories: FICTION