Rules of Summer
Gr 9 Up-Rory is thrilled to be joining her aunt at a beach mansion in New York's Hamptons for the summer. One small wrinkle, though: Fee is the housekeeper, and Rory will be an unpaid errand girl for the fabulously wealthy Rule family. It won't be exactly carefree, blissful fun in the sun, but it will be a departure from small-town New Jersey and the parade of her hair-stylist mother's boyfriends. The youngest Rule daughter, Isabel, also decides to try something new: a romance with Mike, a salt-of-the-earth, local surfer who seems to be calling the shots, and that's a first for her. Gone are the salad lunches with gossip about the same old, same old. Now it's an older guy and a whole different sphere of people. After a rocky start, Rory and Isabel find themselves in an upstairs-downstairs friendship in which Rory tries to teach Isabel to drive while Isabel resolves to find Rory a boyfriend. The guy Rory really likes is Isabel's older brother. Maybe Conner even likes her, but the exacting Mrs. Rule, who fires cooks with alarming frequency, would look down her nose at such an unsuitable attachment. In this serviceable summer romance novel, the girls and their love interests are fleshed out nicely.-Suzanne Gordon, Lanier High School, Sugar Hill, GAα(c) Copyright 2013.  Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc.  No redistribution permitted.