The Summer Invitation

Gr 9 Up—This is a coming-of-age story about two sisters who are invited to spend their summer in New York City by an old friend of their mother's. The girls travel from their home in San Francisco to Greenwich Village to live with a chaperone in their Aunt Theodora's apartment. Their chaperone, Clover, is a young woman who is both an artist and a protégé of their aunt. It is explained to the girls that Theodora is abroad and will be returning at the end of the summer. The sisters visit many of NYC's cultural landmarks while staying in The Village, which gives the book give it an odd nostalgic quality, even though it is set in the present. Franny, the 14-year-old narrator, discovers herself as a writer as she journals her observations of the characters she encounters in New York, and corresponds with her opinionated and worldly Aunt Theodora. There are several frank sexual references throughout the book that contrast sharply with the old-fashioned language that is used. For example, Aunt Theodora insists that pants are called "trousers." The even pacing makes this an easy, lighthearted read and an additional purchase.—Sarah Wilsman, Kent Free Library, Kent, OH