Aimee Friedman

Selkies! One of my favorite legends growing up was about Selkie Maidens--they were always up there with mermaids and sea monsters for things I had to look for whenever I was at the shore (never mind I lived in NJ). And Sea Change manages to preserve the mystery of those mythical creatures quite well. We're not told, one way or the other, the truth behind the legend so like Miranda we can only guess based upon circumstantial evidence and our own fanciful thinking. It doesn't help that show more everything she imagines about Leo can easily be explained in a totally not mythical way--she's a scientist after all, so logical explanations for previously mysterious things should be first nature to her.

There's a sense of wonder to the book--not just because of the legend and the island itself, but about the society that Miranda suddenly finds herself in. These are not the type of people she is used to being around--these teens who act like they are college students and not in high school and who's parents are proud of such things as being able to hold their liquor at fifteen better then their friends. Miranda can logically explain away the occurrences with Leo, but understanding the signals and wordplay that CeeCee and her friends engage in...well that's a whole new science in and of itself.

The Selkie legend is more of an undercurrent to the story, then the actual driving force. Its always brewing in the back of Miranda's mind, but between her mother's shift in behavior (her sensible mother begins to act just like all the other society's ladies), her own pain over what happened with her first boyfriend and the attraction she feels for Leo, she is understandably distracted from obsessing over the matter. The narrative gives a good feeling of the frustrations she feels, the irritation she tries to keep contained and the growing separation she feels from her mother.

Some of the book took a bit too long to occur--Miranda's questioning Leo, the showdown she has with her mom--while others occurred quickly and were gone just as quickly. Also aside from CeeCee none of the other Summer Kids are given much depth. CeeCee fills Miranda in that squares them out a little bit, but overall I was left with a distinctly shallow impression and a need to shake them. CeeCee grows up a little bit, proves herself better then her original appearance predicted at least.

Leo...oh gosh Leo is kind of perfect. Not in the 'he has no flaws at all' way, but in the 'every teen girl wants one' sort of way. He listens, he cares, he gives Miranda thoughtful gifts, talks about their problems, is sweet, and saves her...I mean if you ignore his total evasiveness in regards to his family, where he goes when Miranda doesn't see him, how he just 'appears' when she needs him, his stubbornness about night time swims...he's the perfect summer guy.

Miranda is very mature for her age, but I couldn't tell if that's the product of being a scientist and keeping tight control on her feelings or if she is just that way. She remarks a few times that her older brother was the one who did all the wild stunts and she is happy to be the 'good' child. As we only have a two line conversation between her brother and her on the phone to go by, I can't say what that means. Pretty much her father and brother are non-entities as far as the book is concerned--they're off in California, and thus mentioned but not elaborated upon.

The ending is a left to interpretation. It depends on if you are a glass is half-empty or a glass is half-full sort of person on how you take it. Personally I'm a glass is half-full sort of gal when it comes to my romances, so hope blooms eternal for me. show less

Mermaid lore is revisited in "Sea Change", except this time with a little twist. Instead of the mermaid seeking her prince we're given a "normal" human girl falling for a fish. Friedman's mermaid tale is a lovely take on the whole forbidden love genre. The characters are perfectly painted teens, going through their angst riddled struggles with aplomb. Instead of a loopy heroine we're given the very grounded and logical Miranda, a refreshing voice to carry throughout the story. In true show more "coming-of-age" fashion, Miranda must be pulled out of her comfort zone and effectively changed by her circumstances. The queen of science is thrown into a world of supernatural mystery, effectively woven by the capable Friedman.
Even though I was already aching for a sequel to pick up immediately after, the ending is the perfect bittersweet companion to a realistically rendered Once Upon a Time. show less

***WARNING: This is not a book I particularly recommend, so this review contains spoilers. If you do want to read this book you are more than welcome to come back when you’ve finished and compare notes! Basically it’s all up to you, but you’ve been warned about spoilers in this review! Okay…. that’s enough rambling… On to the review.***

This book was a disappointment, but then again when I started reading it I wasn’t expecting something all that great. I think this is show more definitely a read for younger preteens. I feel like they would find it a lot more interesting and deeper than I did. If I read it when I bought it (which was a LONG time ago) maybe I would have liked it……. Welllllll…. actually probably not :|

The Year My Sister Got Lucky tells the story of two city girl sisters, Michaela and Katie, who move from New York City to a small town when their mom gets a new job. Katie has difficulty accepting the change and longs for her old life. On the other hand, Michaela fits in beautifully with the popular kids, gets a handsome quarterback boyfriend, and becomes Homecoming Queen. These changes in their lives cause a rift to form between the two sisters and that’s pretty much it.

This book had a promising start with the description of Katie and Michaela’s life in the city and how they were serious dancers studying ballet. I love New York so whenever I read about it I will usually get completely enraptured. I love to imagine what it would be like to live there and this book portrayed a really good picture of life in the city.

HOWEVER, once I really got to know the characters I realized something… I did not like either one of these girls! Katie was a naive and selfish 14 year-old, and 17 year-old Michaela came off as an ungrateful bitch. Sounds harsh, but it’s true! The first time this smacked me in the face was when this little exchange happened:

“‘Katie,’ she says. ‘You’re my other half. My sister. The closest person in the world to me.’

‘Same here,’ I say softening as I smile through my tears […]

‘And you’ll always be my sister,’ Michaela goes on. ‘But… you’re not my friend.'”

Ummmmm…. What?!? Why would you say something like that? Not only does she contradict herself with first saying that Katie her other half and that they’re so close, but she also contradicts what we have seen of her character so far. Sure, we are seeing things through Katie’s naive and biased eyes, but up until then we had NO reason to think that Michaela didn’t value their friendship as much as Katie did. Once they move Michaela completely shuns Katie and cuts her out of her life. Very mean indeed. Michaela also becomes unbelievably annoying. She calls people “babe” (gag) and becomes a stupid girl who will give it up to the first quarterback that comes swaggering on by. There is also an air of “poor little rich girl” surrounding Michaela, although their family is not wealthy. Sure, she is put under enormous amounts of pressure from her mother to become a professional ballerina, BUT she admitted that she loves dancing, she is privileged enough to be trained at a prestigious ballet school and she’s got a true shot at Juilliard. But the moment that dancing becomes “work” she wants to give up and go to a community college. OKAY.

Katie’s naivety also got on my nerves because it really didn’t take a genius to figure out what was going on. First of all the shock that she had when seeing her sister interact with other people made me want to smack her in the face. *GASP* Your sister knows how to talk to guys?!? Really? Your sister is putting on jeans and makeup and hangs out with friends? What is so shocking about all of this? This aspect of Katie’s character goes hand in hand with her complete inability to talk to people and how rude she is.
Exhibit A: a cute boy named Sullivan talks to her and helps her up when she trips. What does Katie do? She doesn’t say anything and just WALKS AWAY.
Exhibit B: Soon-to-be-friend Autumn is the only nice person to her on her first day of school and asks her if she wants to walk to class together. She says no and WALKS AWAY. Needless to say it’s not hard to see why Katie isn’t adjusting to her new home.

Two other little notes:
1.The parents. I didn’t understand why Michaela felt she needed to keep EVERYTHING from her parents, namely the fact that she had a boyfriend. Yeah, her mom is controlling, but I never got the impression she’d be opposed to her daughters having a love life. As long as they weren’t distracted too much from dancing.
2. Of course when Katie and Michaela return to the city after 3 months Katie realizes the city isn’t as perfect as she remembered it was and somewhat longs for her quieter town and new friends. Please. You spent your entire life in New York with your friends and all it takes is 3 months in the country for you to decide that it’s actually horrible? Take it from a girl who’s moved A LOT. It doesn’t work that way.

The last thing I want to complain about in this book was the feeling that the strings were not completely tied tight enough for my taste. It’s not an open ending or anything like that, but all the little things that were running throughout the novel get solved in the most anti-climactic way possible. Here is a list of all these unsatisfying solutions.

Katie likes a boy named Jasper. It’s obvious he kind of likes her too. How does is end? “Maybe we could go skating sometime.” “Yeah, maybe” BYE. SEE YA LATER.
Cute possibility of a relationship between Katie’s neighbour, Emmaline and her gym teacher. Does anything come of it? NOPE.

PHEW. So after ALL of that you may be wondering why I didn’t just give this book one star and be done with it. The truth is there were a couple things I did like about this book. First, it was extremely readable and it didn’t take me long to finish it. Secondly I did enjoy the character of Emmaline. Emmaline is a young yoga instructor who has travelled a lot and becomes a sort of confidant for Katie. I wish her character was a little more developed and interacted with Katie a little more, but I did really like her. She was the most relatable character in the book for me, even though we don’t really find out all that much about her, and when we do get a little snippet of her history it’s in the last 10 pages…

Finally I already mentioned that I loved the parts of the book that were set in New York. Just the image of ballerinas studying and performing in New York City, living in an apartment in the East Village, ordering Chinese food, and hurrying to catch the subway appealed to my daydream of living as a young woman in the Big Apple. Loved it!

So to end this incredibly long review, I wouldn’t really recommend this book to anyone over the age of 13. Even so I wouldn’t really recommend this to anyone. If you do want to read it, there are some great reviews on Goodreads, but the only thing I can say is that it’s a quick read so thankfully it won’t take you long to get it over with. show less

I bounced between loving and being annoyed with Miranda, who, while she seems like the kind of girl I would like to hang out with, also kept having huge reactions to nothing. I did appreciate that she came with a backstory that explained some of it, though. Our leading man, Leo, had a great blend of mysterious and charming working for him. His rival, TJ, provided some great contrast with suave jerkitude at its best. (Yes, I think I just invented a word.) The other background characters show more helped to set the stage as the story took me on a tour of the upper class lifestyle in the Old South. Which sounds awesome, by the way. The parties, the debutantes, the courteous gentlemen... the food. Too bad I don’t have any Old Southern relatives to get me entrance to aforementioned lifestyle.

Other than Miranda’s slightly spastic behaviour, my only real complaint about this book is that nothing really gets resolved. I would have liked to see the merpeople mythology fleshed out and explained a little more. What it does ensure, though, is that I will be reading the sequel. I hear there is one in the works. show less