Just the Two of Us - Softcover

Gr 6-8 While they're laughing at the funny incidents in Holly's life, readers will certainly empathize with the heroine, whose mother wants to take her from New York City and the life she's always known to the hinterlands: Des Moines, Iowa. Never having been assertive, Holly strives to find a way to remain by herself in the city, but it's her friend Max Applebaum, always scheming, who arranges for his glamorous parents to keep Holly with them for the summer. The kids cook up a party service, Parties with Pizzazz, and the experiences that they have are very funnyand very believable. But as she observes that lives in other people's homes aren't always what they appear, and that there's no such thing as the perfect situation or perfect parents, Holly longs for her mother and regrets her own lack of loyalty to her. She even looks forward to resuming relations with the father from whom she's been alienated since her parents' divorce three years ago. While entertaining reading, this book is strong on values that should appeal to both kids and adults. Some characters are a little too zany to be believable, but that adds to the enjoyment. Susan F. Marcus, Pollard Middle Sch . , Needham, Mass.

Copyright 1988 Cahners Business Information, Inc.