Forever Summer
Alyson Noel
St. Martin's Griffin, Apr 26 2011, $9.99
ISBN: 9780312604394

"Laguna Cove". Angry Anna loathes moving into the exclusive home of her movie producer father in Laguna Cove because her cheating mom is divorcing her dad to live with her boyfriend. She loathes leaving behind her boyfriend, her friends, and the diving team. Her dad is too busy to meet her at the airport so he sends his lackey Jake to do so. He introduces her to his friend Chris before dumping her at the house so he can surf. At school, she feels like the outsider except for Chris until she meets his friends. Chris becomes her boyfriend but Ellie loathes the newcomer though Anna is unsure why.

"Cruel Summer". Seventeen-year-old Colby has made plans for the summer but those she proposes her parents disposes. They inform her she will spend the summer with her crazy Aunt Tally on a Greek island no one outside of Greece heard of. Instead she wants to remain the new BFF to the school's coolest person Amanda and hang with hunk Levi. Colby joins her nutty aunt only to learn she has no cell phone service or internet access; and forget about a zillion channels - no TV. She begins to jot down her feelings of being exiled to a land before time in her "Cruel Summer" blog that she updates everyday at the nearby Internet caf . She becomes confused about her feelings when she meets Yannis the teen islander.

These reprints of two summer high school tales are fun due to the well rounded lead females as Alyson Noel captures the essence of the belligerent bewildered teen; they each brings resentment, confusion, and vigor to the changes in their respective lifestyles caused by their parents. Readers will enjoy the worst and greatest summers in the lives of angry Anna and cantankerous Colby.

Harriet Klausner