Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, by Ransom Riggs

When Jacob's grandfather is killed, Jacob seems to be the only person who realizes the truth that grandpa was killed by monsters. Jacob himself doesn't want to believe it. He had always been skeptical about his grandfather's stories about evil creatures.

Grandfather was always telling stories. About the boy made up of bees, or the girl who floated in the air, or the invisible boy, or the large bird who took care of all the "peculiar" children when grandpa was still a child himself. But Jacob's own experience convinces him that these stories, which always seemed like fairy tales, must have an element of truth. And now Jacob wants to figure out what that truth was.

Along with his father, he travels to an isolated Welsh island and finds the ruins of the orphanage where grandfather lived. And, while the initial search is fruitless, Jacob eventually finds clues of what happened to the peculiar children, and what dangers lie ahead.

The most striking thing about this book is not so much the story, as its presentation. Through some friends who collect antique photos, Riggs has found several dozen unusual anonymous photographs and created a story that links all of them together. Spread throughout the book, these reproduced images are creepy and yet also beautiful. As a collector myself, this was an innately appealing concept and I enjoyed the design immensely.

Beyond the artistry and the sheer great look of this book, the story is also fun. More time could have been spent describing and developing the peculiar children themselves (who remind me a bit of the teen X-Men), but Riggs has a story to tell and he moves that along quite well. There isn't tremendous emotional depth here, but it's still a decent fantasy-adventure read.

The Mermaid's Mirror, by L. K. Madigan

Lena loves to be by the ocean and dreams of learning to surf. However, for some reason, her father (a legendarily good ex-surfer himself) won't let her try it. But that is just the beginning of the mysteries. There's also the disappearance of her mother when she was younger (which neither her father nor step mother will discuss), a deranged man who wanders the beach looking for someone, and sightings out in the water of strange creatures that look surprisingly human. But as Lena finds out the answers to these mysteries, it forces her to make decisions about her future that have no good solution.

A surprisingly limp telling of the typical YA mermaid tale. It lacks the humor of Real Mermaids Don't Wear Toe Rings or the warm appeal of The Tail of Emily Windsnap. Instead, we get a familiar story of a half-human, half-mer child who seeks out her absent mother. As if that wasn't uninspiring enough, dramatic points bob up to the surface in this story and then sink to the bottom with little notice. At least two separate romances are introduced but left undeveloped. The end result is a story that covers the bases, but never really engages any particular theme.

Through Her Eyes, by Jennifer Archer

Tansy, her mother, and her grandfather move every year or two, so that Mom can live amidst the setting for her next novel. Mom claims that she needs to be immersed in order to write, but Tansy suspects that Mom is afraid of setting down roots. Regardless of the reason, they have lived in many different places, including Nashville, Seattle, and Boston. This time, they end up in small Cedar Canyon, Texas, which happens to also be her grandfather's hometown. While that ought to please grandpa, senility has made him largely uncommunicative. Still, it certainly seems like he isn't too happy to be back home.

For Tansy, small-town Texas certainly isn't a terribly friendly place to live. Most of the kids ignore her, except for a strange but precocious girl several years too young for her grade. But Tansy's social life is only peripheral to this story, because there are strange things afoot! The house they are living in is rumored to be haunted and Tansy has noticed a fair share of unexplained phenomena (seeing people from the past through the viewfinder of her camera, hearing a nightingale's call (even though they are not native to North America), and eventually finding a way to actually enter the world of old photographs). It all points to a horrible event in the past that must be resolved if the hauntings are to cease.

This is a busy supernatural thriller, and poorly paced. While it takes a while to sort everything out, the story meanders so slowly that you find yourself well ahead of the characters. The result of this is that I found myself getting bored waiting for them to figure out what had already become clear to me. More pruning to make the story taut would have helped. The conclusion gets pretty muddy as well, but here it seems intended to leave the ending ambiguous. That didn't work for me either. Overall, I found this a pretty average read.

I Am J, by Cris Beam

J has always known he was a boy, even if his body didn't agree with him. When his mother wanted him to wear dresses, he knew something just felt wrong. And as he hit adolescence, those feelings grew stronger and more complex, even as his body changed in the wrong way.

Now, in his senior year, J reaches a crisis point where he has become tired of being accused of being a dyke by his classmates. He can no longer hide his feelings from his parents. So, he learns how to bind his breasts to hide them, and attempts to strike out on his own as a boy. He practices talking and walking like a boy. He picks up a girl, but finds that the fear of revealing the truth about himself drives a wedge between them. And he dreams of starting hormone treatment to start the physical transition. Along the way, he is confronted by confused and angry friends and family, and realizes that if he's going to actually do this, he may need to do it on his own.

In touching and insightful detail, Beam shows us the inside of an adolescent transgender mind and gives us a taste of the trans community. It's complicated and, while the plot itself hardly moves, the complex mix of frustration, anger, hurt, hope, and naivete that make up J's world is unique enough to make the path interesting. Beam is able to draw effectively on her experience working with trans teens and acknowledges that J's character contains numerous pieces of her clients and friends. In fact, the true love and devotion that the author feels for the trans community shines through on every page of this sympathetic portrait.

At the same time that I was impressed at the groundbreaking nature of this work (that goes far beyond existing novels like Luna or Debbie Harry Sings In French) I was frustrated by Beam's decision to tell this very personal story in the third person. By doing so, the reader is constantly kept at arm's length away from J, and we are forced to learn about his world in only maddeningly brief glances. I suspect that she chose to write the book that way because she lacked the confidence to truly immerse herself in J's mind, but the effort could have paid off so well!

Divergent, by Veronica Roth

Another dystopia (what is the fascination with these things?).

In this one, Chicago has been turned into a camp of competing factions -- Abnegation (self-sacrificing), Candor (honest), Erudite (intellectual), Amity (peaceful), and Dauntless (warring). At the age of 16, each child must choose where they want to live. Beatrice, raised in an Abnegation home, has never felt worthy enough to stay and struggles with her decision. She chooses to become Dauntless. The initiation process is far from easy and a bulk of this book is devoted to that difficult process.

However, there are other forces at play and far more serious stakes. The factions are restless and struggling for control. Beatrice (renaming herself as "Tris") has an important role to play. Her rootless feelings are actually a result of her status as an outsider to all of the factions -- a "divergent" one -- a position that she must keep secret. It may well be the key to saving her people but could easily get her killed.

This is a fairly creative set-up. While one could complain about the simplistic nature of carving out such absolute "factions," it's well-implemented. The book itself doesn't break much new ground though. There's the high degree of brutality and violence that has become a trademark of the genre (e.g., Hunger Games or Ship Breaker). There's the appealing but ultimately egocentric idea that adults are worthless for saving the world and that only a team of adolescents can pull it off. In other words, stuff we've seen before. The novel does have some interesting things to say about violence, parents, and fear, but in the end, it's mostly a gorefest. This is seen most clearly in the token romances in the story, which are never allowed to interfere too much with the action. Once the troops fall under mind control (in a sequence lifted shamelessly from the movie I Robot), we just sit back and watch the body count climb. Movie options and the sequel (due in May 2012) are a foregone conclusion.

She Loves You, She Loves You Not, by Julie Anne Peters

When Alyssa's father discovers that she is a lesbian, he throws her out of the house and she has to go live with her estranged mother in a small town in Colorado. Traumatized by the events that have led up to her exile (which include a powerful and ultimately obsessional relationship with a girl two years younger) and feeling alone and abandoned by family and friends, she tries to adapt to her new surroundings. In doing so, she discovers that her understandings of her own family and herself are not nearly as clear as she once thought, and that the path to recovery will take her to very different places.

Peters has made a great career out of writing insightful books about adolescent LGBTs. While they share that theme in common, each novel is strikingly unique. Her characters are thoughtful and introspective, but believably immature. Sexual orientation is core to the stories and she does a great job of illustrating both universal truths about all teens as well as the unique issues that young people face if they are gay. And so, this story shows us how the interference of adults (and the homophobia of society itself) complicates the already volatile nature of adolescent romance. How young gays struggle with their identity, not yet certain of which way they want to be (and thus mess with each other's heads as a result) becomes a story which is neither superficial nor didactic polemic. Instead, homosexuality is essential to the story that is ultimately not about sexual orientation at all.

The book does have some rough spots. We have numerous subplots (Alyssa's relationship with her parents and her step-mother, romantic betrayals both between children and between adults, some natural disasters, several road accidents, and a little workplace drama). As usual, these seem distracting from the story, as if Peters wasn't too sure where any of them were going when she wrote them in, and then couldn't bring herself to prune them out later. The stylistic device of doing flashbacks in second-person narration is awkward as well. Still, the overall sensitivity and sympathy of the story make this a great book for readers, regardless of which way they swing.

Flip, by Martyn Bedford

When Alex wakes up one morning, he notices that things are definitely wrong (wrong bed, wrong room) and when he looks in the mirror he has the biggest shock of all -- he's in the wrong body! Somehow, he's become another boy altogether -- Philip "Flip" Garamond. And the two of them couldn't be any more different: Flip is apparently a rap-loving jock with a lot of friends and a way with the women, while Alex is a shy nerd. Trying to maintain the pretense of being Flip on the outside while still being Alex inside is difficult to do, but no one will believe Alex that he isn't Flip. To them, their old chum Flip is just acting a bit peculiar.

Time is running out. As Alex learns more about what has happened to him (and Flip), it becomes clear that if it is ever going to be possible to switch back, it will have to be soon. However, the process is anything but clear (and maybe even impossible?). So Alex must hurry to figure it out or risk being trapped forever in the wrong body.

There's no major emotional lesson here, but plenty of good mind-twisting suspense and adventure. Bedford has excellent pacing and the story keeps you entertained and enthralled. I was definitely sucked in and found it to be a good read.

Close to Famous, by Joan Bauer

Foster and her mother are fleeing from Mom's ex-boyfriend (an abusive Elvis impersonator) when they end up in Culpepper, West Virginia. The town's seen better days (the local jam and jelly factory has been shut down and the only large amployer in town is a prison), but they find a home there.

Foster has a lot of things working against her (her codependent mothetr, illiteracy, and a fear of failure), but she also has perseverence, a strong memory, and incredible baking skills. So, it's her way in a kitchen (and the baked goods she produces) that will make a difference in her world. As she improves her own lot, she also inspires a boy who dreams of becoming a documentary filmmaker and an actress who has slipped into life as a recluse.

Bauer has a great formula, taking young women with a particular talent and showing take that skill places. Previously, we've seen it in waitressing (Hope Was Here), pumpkin growing (Squashed), and shoe sales (Rules of the Road), among others. It's a narrative that provides ample opportunity to show growth and achieve a feel-good ending. And it tends to work best when the story fixates on the plot.

Unfortunately, it's a lack of focus which really does this in. Bauer is fond of subplots and this book is drowning in them. In fact, it really isn't clear what is the main story. Is it Foster's culinary talent (hard to see it when there's no contest or climax to the baking story)? Is it Foster's struggle with literacy (that one's left unfinished and unresolved)? Throw in crazy Elvis dude, the manic actress, and the boy and it all feels rather random and unplotted.

Ten Things We Did (and Probably Shouldn't Have) by Sarah Mlynowski

When April's father announces that he's gotten a new job in Cleveland and that they are going to have to move away from Connecticut in the next few days, April is devastated. She's just gotten up the nerve to have sex with her boyfriend Noah and there's also a lifetime of friends that she will miss. But her best friend Vi has another idea: April can come stay with her. The problem: Vi's mother is going to be gone as well so the girls will be alone in the house. While it seems impossible at first, April manages to convince her father that she'll be properly chaperoned and the girls embark on a teen's dream of home alone and unsupervised parties.

However, the independence is not anything like April imagined. She has to struggle to sort through her life (learning to cook, start a dishwasher, etc.) and makes plenty of mistakes along the way. While she makes some bad decisions, she also learns that she can live with the consequences. What she doesn't count on is how lonely it is to live on your own.

This is a book to give any parent the chills to imagine, but moving beyond the premise, there's a nice story here about growth, making a few mistakes, but overall owning your life. It could have all turned out a lot worse, but there are enough downturns to be realistic without melodrama. Things do wrap up a bit too sweetly in the girl (with life's problems solved through girl bonding and donuts) but you root for these kids and their path to self-realization. Fun!

Bumped, by Megan McCafferty

In the near future, a virus has turned the majority of people sterile by the time they turn eighteen. Now, only teenagers can have children. And that has had two important consequences: becoming a pregnant teen has become both cool and the economic value of pregnancy has given young girls a new (and mostly false) sense of agency (with no small irony, being a professional surrogate mother is now so lucrative that girls do it to put themselves through college!).

Enter Melody and her twin sister Harmony. Separated at birth, Melody has grown up in this pro-natal culture and dreams of signing a major contract as a professional surrogate. Harmony, in contrast, has been raised in a religious commune where girls marry in their early teens to fulfill their child-bearing duties before they are too old. Both young women have totally swallowed the myths of their culture, but meeting each other opens their eyes a bit. And a case of mistaken identity (which is both humorous and tragic) that causes the two of them to swap roles sends both girls in very different and unexpected trajectories.

McCafferty is probably best known for her light beach-readers, so the cutting nature of this dystopia will surprise her fans. While she certainly has a few harebrained ideas, McCafferty's story provides some wonderful observations about popular culture, the commodification of bodies, and the similarities between our culture's worship of youth and of motherhood. It's an edgy idea and if it sparks some thought about the way that the glamor of youth and motherhood are basically sold the same way to children, so much the better.

As for the writing, the story starts a bit slow and the slang used in the book is a bit hard to digest at first, but it has a wonderful irony to it that hooked me (although digs against social networking will probably not age well). The characters themselves are not terribly interesting and things wrap a bit too fast towards the end (with the exception of the inevitable loose end that was left for the equally inevitable sequel), but this is a story about an alternative reality more than a book about characters or even plot. Decent social satire.

Miles From Ordinary, by Carol Lynch Williams

Given how crazy Mom is, it falls on Lacey to protect her mother from flying off the rails. Sometimes, Mom is OK, but if Lacey isn't careful, Mom will go and do something nutty (like spend all of their money on food to survive an impending war or she'll wander half-naked into other people's homes). Aunt Linda used to help out some, but after fourteen years, Lacey has come to understand that she's the only one who can take care of Mom.

All of that may change on a special day when Mom is trying out working her first day as a cashier at the Winn Dixie. Lacey hopes that this may give her Mom a sense of purpose and some focus with which to straighten out. Lacey, meanwhile, is on her first day of volunteering at the library, which may give her an outlet away from Mom. Things don't go well, but in the midst of the crisis that develops, Lacey befriends a boy who may inspire Lacey to take some hesitant initial steps towards changing the downward trajectory of her life.

I'm not a fan of kids-in-peril stories and this novel takes the parts of that genre that I despise most (hapless adults, abusive manic-depressive mothers, and codependent families) and puts them on steroids. Reading a story like this basically begs the question: why? Why write a story like this? Is it supposed to be inspirational? I'm tempted, instead, to see it as exploitative.

I kept hoping for some relief from the continuous dark grind, but what I got was 195 pages of child abuse (with the slight possibility that an adult might come through in the end to look out for Lacey). The whole experience is made more painful by a broken timeline, heavy on flashback. This is probably intended to make the grind easier to bear, but it mostly makes us passive recipients of the horrible things which we already know will come. The supporting characters (the boy, the aunt, etc.) are largely throwaway. Gratuitous animal death appears as well. What's to like?

I'll Be There, by Holly Goldberg Sloan

When Emily humiliates herself singing "I'll Be There" at church and Sam happens to witness the event, a string of events ensues that would defy reason, except for the careful chronicling of author Holly Goldberg Sloan.

Sam (and his little brother Riddle) have spent their lives being dragged around by their mentally unstable outlaw father Clarence. Having never known any other sort of life, the hardships that they endure seem normal. That is, until Sam's chance meeting with Emily introduces the boys to a possible alternative life. But as the story patiently explains, everyone has different motivations and conflicting needs, and these can have entirely unexpected consequences.

This story's unusual calling card are all of its digressions. The tale itself might have been told in a third of its pages, except for Sloan's practice of backing up and letting each new character essentially tell their life story. In some hands this might be quite annoying as it inevitably leads to delayed gratification for the resolution of the latest plot twist. But here, each detail is somehow important to the plot and it all comes together in the end. Moreover, you know it will all come together in the end, so you just ride this slow train and enjoy the scenery along the way.

While I enjoyed reading the book, I am unclear who is the intended audience. As an adult reader, the maturity of many of the situations (and the adult details of many of the characters) was a draw. But how much patience would a younger reader have for taking in all the details of someone's failed marriage or career frustrations? And as a story so long on action (and low on emotions or feelings), it really seemed better written for younger readers. So, I'd argue that it is a book for younger readers, but like a children's movie, there's plenty here for the adults to enjoy. That would work in a film, but in a book it seems a bit more muddled.

I'm Not Her, by Janet Gurtler

Tess lacks the popularity, good looks, and confidence of her older sister Kristina. She's a wallflower and utterly ignored by her sister's friends (unless they are drunk guys hitting on her). However the fates change suddenly when Kristina is diagnosed with bone cancer. Now, as Kristina struggles with chemo and withdraws into self-pity, it is Tess who takes center stage at school as she becomes the point of contact with the outside world. And as their parents start to come unglued, it is Tess who surprises everyone (not least herself) by stepping forward and being the strong one.

The story could so easily fall into melodrama, but even as one trauma after another piles up, the story somehow never grows to be too much. The ending is bittersweet and some of the losses are completely unexpected and will hit you in the gut. However, the messages of the story (standing up for yourself, staying loyal to your family) are presented powerfully. It's a heartwarming story of sisterly devotion presented in a satisfying fashion.

Fixing Delilah, by Sarah Ockler

Delilah is going through a rough patch. Her Mom is too busy to notice until Delilah gets caught shoplifting and skips out on her curfew to be with her dead-end boyfriend. But all of this gets swept aside when they receive the news that Delilah's maternal grandmother has died -- the same grandmother that Delilah hasn't been allowed to see for the past eight years. And so the summer of Delilah's seventeenth year is now suddenly full with returning to her grandma's town, helping her mother and aunt clean the house to sell it, and confronting the ghosts of her and her family's past.

One review on the book jacket compared this book to Sarah Dessen's writing and I can see the parallels. For example, we have the distant and self-absorbed mother who makes the daughter's interest in others look like Mother Theresa. But the similarities are superficial (the boy interest is nowhere near as prominent and the heroine is not nearly as introspective).

It will come as no surprise that the mother and daughter will eventually reconcile and provide decent reader catharsis in the process. The similarly predictable trajectory of the love interest is less satisfying: while the boy-loses-girl moment felt honest (and maybe a bit harrowing), their reconciliation seemed forced. And while the book is good at piling up conflict and challenges, the ending is overall a bit too happy and rosy for my taste.

Overall, it's the unevenness of this book that did me in. The middle sags and key moments (first kiss, for example) get lost in the midst of endless mood setting and exposition. The strong climax is weakened by the lame ending. It's a mixed bag.

The Friendship Doll, by Kirby Larson

In 1927, fifty-eight delicately-built and life-sized dolls were sent from Japan to the United States as "friendship ambassadors" to reciprocate an earlier gift from the US to Japan, and to facilitate greater cultural understanding between the two countries. In this novel, Kirby imagines how one of those dolls might have changed the lives of four girls over the years. The doll (Miss Kanagawa) comes to life at optimum moments to affect the children and guide them towards making correct life decisions.

It could be a bit creepy to imagine an animate doll (and the idea isn't entirely original), but the question of the doll's consciousness is kept vague and isn't terribly crucial to the story. Instead, we can almost imagine that each of the doll's young interlopers reached their epiphany on their own. The result is that Miss Kanagawa becomes a conduit for telling this more general story about friendship and loyalty (thus, the story reminded me more of violin in The Red Violin than Chuckie in Child's Play II!). Each episode is a moving story and they are surprisingly well-connected to each other. The ending is a bit anti-climactic but doesn't detract from the story.

One of the real strengths of this book is the strong basis of the story in historical fact. The settings are familiar and well-worn (Dust Bowl refugees, Depression survivors, New York Society figures, etc.) and one could have wished for a wider spread of years (why not put a story in the 50s or 60s?), but Larson does well with what she picks to cover and the stories will entice young readers to learn more. The historical notes at the end are particularly well-written and noteworthy.

Angry Young Man, by Chris Lynch

Robert has a lot on his shoulders. His Mom struggles to make ends meet and provide food on the table for her boys. Robert has this to worry about and also his younger brother, who seems a bit bipolar and has trouble putting things in perspective. Xan (the brother) is obsessed with social justice and wants to right the wrongs of the world. Robert tries to give him perspective and keep it together. But as Xan gets sucked under the spell of a charismatic nihilist, Robert discovers that he is not so immune himself from the charms of anger. The results are explosive and nearly tragic.

Lynch's novel Inexcusable was a near miss for me, with its over-simplification of male violence and pendantic storyline. This, however, is another story. Lynch does a fantastic job of capturing fraternal bonds and the guilt and loyalty (or is it guilty loyalty?) that underlies the relationship between brothers that have faced adversity and not come through it as well as social norms dictate that they should. There's aching familiarity to this story, even if the violence is alien territory.

Seldom do I find books about young men that ring true (too many hang on the moments of libido for comic value) but this one really grew on me, even if the story was disturbing and a turn off. I give serious props to Lynch for presenting a story so authentic! It's not a pretty sight, but the love that these boys feel for each other will touch you.

How I Stole Johnny Depp's Alien Girlfriend, by Gary Ghislain

David is a shy fourteen year old who fantasizes about girls, but has trouble relating to them. He lives with his father, a psychologist who specializes in troubled teens, one of which is the mesmerizing Zelda, on whom David develops a serious crush. The trouble is that Zelda is criminally violent and convinced that she is an alien sent to abduct her "chosen one" (Johnny Depp) and return him to her planet to be her slave. But David is as obsessed with spending time with Zelda as Zelda is with kicking policemen and stealing away Jack Sparrow. And so an unlikely alliance forms with David helping Zelda escape and joining forces to help her complete her mission. Much mayhem ensues and the plot veers from the barely believable to the totally insane.

It's a cute and quirky story, but not nearly as funny as the title implied (or I was hoping for). There are occasional wise cracks and situations that will prompt a chuckle, but the story falls into silliness a bit faster than humor. Written by an ex-pat in France, it's got that weird Gaullist sense (these are, after all, the folks who find Jerry Lewis amusing). It's also a bit disturbing the way that the female characters walk over David. I imagine it was supposed to be funny to watch how helpless David is against feminine wiles, but it just seemed perverse (as if placing women on pedestals was somehow amusing). Overall, a promising premise with a dud delivery.

Across the Universe, by Beth Revis

When Amy's parents decide to join the mission to Centauri (which will take hundreds of years and require them to be cryogenically frozen), Amy is offered the chance to stay behind on Earth. Fatefully, she decides to come along. Deep in the future, Amy awakens to discover that an accident has caused her to be unfrozen early. But that is the least of her worries. Something has gone terribly wrong since the ship left Earth and it is now being commanded by a dictator who has enslaved the support crew with drugs. Worse, someone is murdering the frozen crew before they can reach their destination.

Billed as "entirely original" on the jacket, people who know their sci-fi will recognize Ben Bova's Exiled from Earth series here (and a few allusions to some other classics). But even if Revis owes a debt or two, she spins an exciting story. It gets a bit complicated and runs long (the last ten pages in particular were unnecessary and needed to be excised), but the characters are interesting. The plot is well-paced and the mysteries are unraveled at a good pace. Nothing extraordinary but it is decent science fiction and a good read.

Forgotten, by Cat Patrick

London has amnesia and manages to forget everything that's happened during the day when she goes to sleep every night. To cope with this, she leaves herself notes that brief her on what has just happened. So far, so Memento (a totally cool movie from the 90s with a chunk of the cast of The Matrix in it), but the weirder part is that what London does remember comes from the future. So, while she can't remember anything that has happened, she knows what will take place soon.

The situation becomes complicated when London meets a boy (Luke) who she can't identify (given her ability to know the future, this can only mean that he doesn't have one, which is odd since she's madly in love with him). Luke's existence is more than some sort of paradox -- he's triggering other sorts of memories in London's mind, some of which are quite disturbing.

The premise of this unusual story can be a bit hard to get your head around (and it suffers from a few logical inconsistencies), but once you let go and just start trusting the author, it takes off nicely. I was less thrilled with the rushed ending, but up until the last twenty pages or so, I really liked the way that the story unfolded, with a lot of twists and good pacing. And for such an ambitious premise, Patrick really does a great job of putting it together.

The Last Little Blue Envelope, by Maureen Johnson

(If you haven't read Thirteen Little Blue Envelopes yet, you might want to do that before reading this sequel or its review! You have been warned!)

I'm not a big fan of sequels, but I think that this was one I was really looking forward to read, precisely because the idea of a sequel was never in the cards when the first book appeared. Instead, we were left with such an ending that the average reader was simply dying to have the story get concluded. After trudging across Europe through twelve envelopes with our heroine, it was a major annoyance that the thirteenth and final letter had been stolen and we ended up (much like our heroine Ginny) without any real sense of closure (fairy tale substitite endings aside!). I accepted that it was life and was prepared to move on, but was ecstatic when I read that there was a sequel and that the lost letter had been found!!

In this sequel, a few months have passed and Ginny is working on her college admission essay without a lot of success. She wants to recount the story of her trip and the twelve envelopes, but is suffering a major case of writer's block that gets in the way. In the midst of that frustration, she receives an email from a stranger named Oliver who has recovered the stolen letters. He offers to return them, but there's a catch: the last letter mentions a piece of Aunt Peg's artwork (potentially worth a fortune) and how to locate it. Oliver wants a piece of the action and won't turn over the letter unless Ginny agrees to take another trip through Europe on one final scavenger hunt. Against any rational advice, Ginny agrees to do so.

Along with old flame Keith (and his new girlfriend Ellis), Ginny and Oliver travel through some familiar territory and some new stomping grounds in search of Aunt Peg's artwork and some closure to a hard-earned quest. The results are at once predictable (Ginny and Oliver will naturally hit it off despite their awkward start) and fun (even old places look different a second time around).

The sequel, with its lovely detail and eye for color, will appeal to armchair travelers (Johnson has obviously collected her fair share of travel yarns) and the romantic elements have a suitable level of involvement to snag the reader. Mostly, though, this novel improves upon its predecessor as it closes with less convenient solutions and more open-ended conclusions. Yes, Ginny lives a fairly charmed life (worthy of a Meg Cabot novel), but things here are left more realistic than before. At the very least, Ginny has moved beyond her late aunt (and even her childhood) and is ready to impart on more mature adventures. The demand (and temptation) for a third installment are substantially reduced.