Alex McAuley Lost Summer

Lost Summer

Alex McAuley

MTV, Aug 2006, $9.95

ISBN: 1416525734

Divorcee Kathryn informs her sixteen year old daughter Caitlin that they will spend the summer on Danbroke Island on the North Carolina Outer Banks because she feels her two children are out of control. Caitlin is outraged as she planned to sing backup with her boyfriend's band while her eleven year old brother Luke accepts a four wheel bribe from his wealthy mother.

After traveling from La Jolla, California the three Rosses reach their destination, the Pirates Lodge, owned by Bill Collins, Kathryn's high school boyfriend. Her two children realize they are across the country because their prescription crazed mother was hoping to renew an old fling. The teen makes friends with an out of place Goth Danielle, but as a hurricane approaches she fears Bill, who always leers at her when he is not "accidentally" touching her. She has no one to turn to as her mom hides behind her drug stupor, her brother continues to be the same lunatic he was on the west coast, and her dad abandoned the family last year.

LOST SUMMER is an interesting family drama starring a beleaguered female teen with no place to turn to except to a degree another isolated peer as Bill increasingly tries to take unwanted liberties with her while her mom pretends all is well. Kathryn and Luke are purposely made extreme out of control stereotypes so that their hedonistic destructive behavior negatively impacts Caitlin especially during the isolated LOST SUMMER.

Harriet Klausner