Author: Maureen Johnson
Publisher: Point
Rating: WORTHY!
I'm not sure quite how to share this with you so I'll just come right out and say it: I'm in Love with Maureen Johnson. It just happened. I didn't plan it. It crept up on me. I read both her 'Scarlett' novels back to back and they stunned me into it. Even when I was thinking "I don't like this a bit", I couldn't shed myself of my overpowering loyalty to her cause. I love these two novels and you should read them right now. I'll be checking on you to make sure that you do.
Now about these new covers.... Gone is the goofy-looking girl on the cover of book one. I guess when the publisher discovered that Johnson had more than one volume in her on this character, they decided to start a series theme cover. Sucks to be them. The original cover of volume one had much more character. Literally! Fortunately the actual novel starts out by being every bit as entertaining as the other one was. Shame it's so let down by the trashy cover. This is one very good reason why I normally treat covers as utterly irrelevant.
In this novel, the summer is winding down, the hotel production of Hamlet is over, the hotel is still largely empty (how do they manage, financially, to keep a five-storey hotel running with no guests?!), and Scarlett is still an appendage of Amy. The good news is that lame YA trope Eric is out of the picture, but the sad news is that he's far from out of Scarlett's mind.
This part I didn't really get. I get that a fifteen-year-old girl who has never had a boyfriend might fall for someone she sees as exotic and new, but I honestly felt her attachment to him in volume one was a betrayal of who Scarlett was supposed to be. In this volume it seems to me to be a further betrayal of who she is that she's so helplessly and hopelessly pining for him when their relationship had nothing going for it, and especially given that it was so short term and so sparsely furnished, and even more especially given that he betrayed her. If they'd been dating and "in love" for a couple of years, then I would have expected even Scarlett to behave the way she does in this novel, but when we're told who she is and what kind of character she is, and she behaves this way after such a reed-thin relationship, it takes a bit more believing than I have available to offer! That was one of those 'I don't like this a bit' bits I mentioned in the overture.
In other news, Scarlett's friends, we're told, have returned from their exciting and exotic summers, but we get only the briefest of glances at them. This seems to be a further false note in this novel, especially given how much we've had it blasted into us that they are so close and such good friends of Scarlett's. That was another of those 'I don't like this a bit' bits previously mentioned.
Having got the bitching and whining out of the way, let's look at what Johnson offers that's new. Here, there's plenty of fresh produce to enjoy on her stall. Amy Amberson has moved out of the hotel and found an apartment. She's opened her own acting agency, and taken on Spencer of course, as her first client. Now she's hunting down more, and one prospect, named Chelsea, who conveniently happens to be Scarlett's age, is in her sights. It's because of this new client that Scarlett ends up meeting Max, Chelsea's older bother, who is something of a social misfit. It seems obvious that something is going to blossom there, but Max is just far enough divorced from trope that he's actually an interesting and welcome character.
After the first third of the novel, Scarlett returns to school, so there was a chance to see that aspect of her character, which I was really looking forward to. Frankly, the hotel scenario was becoming decidedly claustrophobic! So Lola comes out with a huge surprise for the family. Good for her! Marlene is a delight. Spencer is charming and brings more surprises. But the real joy of this novel (apart from the perfect ending), is Scarlett's relationship with Max, and her comments. She's smart, funny, brilliant, inventive, not shy of working, and really moves this novel all over the place. I loved it, even the bits I didn't like, and as I said, the ending left me wanting a volume three, so anyone who can, pester Johnson mercilessly so that she has no choice but to turn this dilogy into a trilogy - or maybe she has?
