Awkward Autumn of Lily Mclean

October 1, 2017

Gr 8 Up-It's the first day of high school for Lily McLean of Largs, a real town in Scotland. Lily is raised by a single mother, and she and her family eke by financially. Lily is the responsible daughter, who studies hard and helps care for her three younger stepsiblings, while older sister Jenna has turned into a Terrible Teen. Lily has a small group of close friends who are definitely not part of the "in" crowd, except for Rowan, whom she has known the longest but who lives next door to Georgia, one of the girls who treats Lily like scum. This follow-up to The Mixed-Up Summer of Lily McLean has potential, but the characters are badly drawn, and the plot requires plenty of suspension of disbelief. In the previous volume, Lily discovered that she was telepathic. So when she learns that Jenna is hanging out with a boy who was expelled from school, she decides to try to "reach" her sister and make her see reason. Unbelievably, Jenna claims she can hear Lily speaking to her. She listens to her sister's warnings and runs away when the boy convinces her to help him break into the school. The author's writing doesn't quite pull off the premise. VERDICT Not recommended.-Marlyn Beebe, Long Beach Public Library, CA

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