Fifteen (original 1956; edition 1980)

Clearly Beverly Cleary 2012, Book 1. ( )

Beverly Cleary’s Fifteen, published in 1956, tells the story of a few months in the life of fifteen-year-old Jane Purdy. Jane considers herself an ordinary girl – she spends most of her free time babysitting, her parents are embarrassing, and she wants nothing more than a cute boyfriend with a car. Things start to look up when she meets Stan Crandall, the new boy in town, and he invites her to the movies. Jane really likes him, and thinks he likes her, but not everything goes as planned. He spends too much time talking to cool girl Marcy, their date to Chinatown involves eating bizarre foods, and he doesn’t invite her to the first school dance. Will things ever go Jane’s way?

Fifteen is a fun and pleasant read, but doesn’t offer much in the way of substance. Jane does learn to be herself and not worry what others think about her, but most of the book is concerned with whether or not Stan will call her after one seemingly embarrassing event or another. Still, Jane’s affability and naivete are endearing and the other characters, however briefly mentioned, are fun as well. Many of Jane’s concerns – embarrassing parents, what to wear, will he call? – still apply to today’s teens, even if they’re not worried about their mother not wearing stockings, wearing the same suit twice, and tying up the party phone line. I definitely found this more accessible than Seventeenth Summer, which has a similar storyline, but that probably has more to do with Cleary’s writing style than cultural differences due to time period. I could see tweens enjoying this, especially for those who are graduating from Cleary’s younger books. ( )

Realistic, down-to-earth characters. The story of 15-year-old Jane and her relationship with Stan. An okay book. ( )

Fifteen is a story about romance. Jane, who is 15, meets a young boy who she thinks is amazing. And to add to it, he can drive. Jane is the girl who is corky, babysits, and makes good grades; while Stan is the cool guy in school. The story is set in 1959 where the boys waited for the girls to seated, opened the door for them, and never took anything futher than a kiss. After some awarkd moments, Stan and Jane work things out and really hit it off. This is an amazing book to have in a classroom for young girls. It relates to all the werid moments that new relationships go through without the heavy inimate scences. It can also teach the boys a few things about how a girl should be treated.

Jane Purdy is just your normal, everyday teen growing up in the 1950s. She has babysitting jobs that she trades off sometimes with her best friend, Julie. She is not one of the popular crowd, like Marcy who has a ton of cashmere sweaters (Jane just has one), nor part of the intellectual crowd. But despite all this, she meets a boy while she is babysitting a holy terror, otherwise known as Sandra, and he's interested in her! Now if only her parents will let her go to the movies with him...

The more things change, the more things stay the same. That's what kept coming to mind as I read. Sure, the details change - I didn't wear a peasant blouse with my dirndl skirt or put my hair up in pin curls (alright, I had to look up what the latter was). I didn't worry about my mom not wearing stockings. But some of the same old teenage worries are there: Will my parents embarrass me? Will a boy like me? When I was younger, I read more of the Ramona books than Beverly Cleary's other books, and this had a similar feel of the earnest feelings of an eight- (or fifteen-) year-old. It was an odd experience being so much older than the protagonist, and I'm afraid I laughed at Jane much more than I ever laughed at Ramona. Though I wouldn't have read this at fifteen, it was a sort of nostalgic, wholesome, old-fashioned look at being the age, and I could relate Jane to my own teenage years. ( )