the summer i turned pretty
by Jennifer Han

Belly (a nickname for Isabel) lived for the summers--the long summers in Susannah's beach house, with her mother, Laurel, and brother Steven and Susannah and her boys, Jeremiah and Conrad.  Susannah and Laurel had been best friends forever, so they blended their families every summer.  Jeremiah and Conrad seemed as much Belly's brothers as Steven did, except she had always had a crush on Conrad. If Conrad noticed it, he never gave any indication.  This summer, the summer of Belly's sixteenth birthday, everything seemed different.  Steven was only there for a couple of weeks because he was leaving to visit colleges with his dad, Belly was dating a local boy, which didn't seem to make Jeremiah and Conrad very happy, Conrad was aloof and angry all the time, and Susannah spent a lot of time in her bedroom.  The tension was thick, but Belly didn't know what was wrong.  She only knew that for the first time ever, she was being noticed, and she liked it.  When Susannah's illness finally comes out, Belly realizes what has been wrong with Conrad all summer, and she also realizes nothing can be the same again.  An appealing coming of age story with an ending that didn't quite add up.            ~reviewed by Mrs. Sams