Take It from the Top

Starred review from September 15, 2024
During their sixth summer at Lamplighter Lake Summer Camp for the Arts, two girls' broken friendship is tested even further. Thirteen-year-olds Eowyn Becker and Jules Marrigan became best friends during their first Wisconsin camp summer. Over the years, though, their friendship has developed cracks. Talented Eowyn suffers from severe stage fright, desperately misses her deceased mother, and resents her doctor father and Broadway-star brother, who have little time for her. She covets Jules' supportive family and effortless onstage presence. For her part, West Virginian scholarship camper Jules covets Eowyn's wealth and connections and feels that Eowyn doesn't understand her less-fortunate circumstances. Jules is also bothered by Eowyn's oblivious need for attention, which ruined last summer's show, taking the spotlight off Jules in her lead role. When both girls (who present white) earn starring roles inWicked this summer, can they, like Galinda and Elphaba, find their way past their mutual loathing and become friends who truly see each other? Told in Eowyn's first-person voice in the present and Jules' third-person perspective in the past, this masterful exploration of friendship gone wrong is permeated with a bone-deep, warts-and-all love of both camp and theater. Evocative worldbuilding brings Lamplighter to life for the intimately developed, well-intentioned characters, who often struggle to see other points of view. The well-paced interweaving of multiple summers' experiences builds tension and shines light on how the past reverberates into the present. Brilliantly executed: a gem that's a love letter to theater and summer camp.(Fiction. 9-13)

COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

October 15, 2024
Grades 4-7 Jules and Eowyn have been best friends ever since they met six years ago at fine-arts summer camp Lamplighter Lake. This year, though, Jules is suddenly distant. She's from a lower-income family that doesn't have a school with fine arts-programs, whereas Eowyn has a wealthy father and a Broadway-star brother. Eowyn's mother died when she was young, so for Eowyn, camp is a place of respite, whereas for Jules it's a place to find belonging. While their friendship fractures, the musical of their dreams, Wicked, is selected as the main-stage show. As the story is told in flashbacks from Jules' point of view and present-day chapters from Eowyn's, readers uncover the ways jealousy has crept into the girls' friendship. The clever use of Wicked, with Elphaba and Glinda's story mirroring that of Eowyn and Jules, provides an effective way to share the importance of the arts in telling stories and helping to process real-life issues. A must-read for middle-grade fans looking for realistic friendship stories that tug at the heartstrings.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from September 16, 2024
Eowyn Becker lives for theater summer camp, where she can follow in her deceased stage star mother’s footsteps and finally hang out with her long-distance best friend Jules. The northern Wisconsin camp also provides welcome relief from the stress of her Broadway star older brother’s career and her distracted, grieving father. As 13-year-olds, Eowyn and Jules get to participate in the musical production at the end of the summer, and as the camp’s best singer, Eowyn is gunning for a leading role, despite her stage fright that’s been getting worse. And Jules has seemed distant lately, even cold. Eowyn doesn’t understand why but worries that it’s because of a disastrous incident during last year’s show. When the two are cast as leads in Wicked, Eowyn hopes that working together will help mend their friendship, but the rift only deepens. The vibrant and exceptionally rendered setting makes for a compelling backdrop against which layered character building unravels. Swinarski (What Happened to Rachel Riley?) intersperses Eowyn’s conversational narration—suffused with theater-obsessed sensibilities—with sympathetic third person chapters that cover the events of previous summers, offering context and history to the white-cued girls’ relationship. Ages 8–12. Agent: Alexander Slater, Sanford J. Greenburger Assoc.