Bibliography:
Underdahl, S.D. 2008. Remember This. Woodbury, Minnesota: Flux. ISBN: 978-0-7387-1401-1
Plot Summary:
16 year old Lucy has the summer all figured out. She and best friend Sukie will make the cheerleading squad, and spend their days learning cheers and becoming friends with some of the most popular girls in school. Lucy isn’t sure she really wants to be a cheerleader, but goes along because Sukie is sure that this is the way for them to have the best school year ever. When Sukie makes the squad and Lucy doesn’t, everything seems to start to change. Sukie starts to spend time with her new friends, the new guy that starts working at the restaurant turns out to be Sukie’s nemesis, and Lucy’s parents tell her that they are worried about her favorite grandmother and namesake, Grandma Lucy, who has been struggling with living alone. They are worried that she is suffering from dementia or other problems. Over the course of the summer, Lucy learns that everything and everyone changes, including herself.
Critical Analysis:
The beginning of this book has a very timeless feel to it. Two girls practicing to make the cheerleading squad could be two girls from 50 years ago in Any City, USA. And while there are events in the story that bring it forward to the present day, as a whole, it still feels a little gentle. At first, I wondered whether that was a detriment to the book. What teen wants to read a story that doesn’t feel new and current? But the more I thought about it, the more I realized that this is not really old fashioned. Instead, the author is portraying a normal teen with a great family life and set of friends who is faced with changes in her world and how she copes with them. That situation, I think applies to many teens out there, and this book may be more relateable than a story about abuse or drugs or sex. It shows that someone like them struggles and copes with serious issues too.
Lucy carries the story here, her thoughts and actions and worries make up the story, and she is a delightful character. There are some well drawn scenes, including one where Lucy has to talk one of the heartbroken waitresses at her job into coming out of the bathroom when there is a huge rush, and another one where she mistakenly drinks a whole bunch of strawberry margaritas, not realizing that they contained alcohol. Grandma Lucy is also important to the story, and while she is different now, the reader sees glimpses of how she used to be through Lucy’s stories and old post cards that are interspersed between chapters. I wish the postcards had included the pictures on the front.
I am afraid the cover does this book no favors, as it doesn’t hint about the full story contained within. Matter of fact, when I first saw it, I assumed it was historical fiction. Nonetheless, I recommend this book for those normal teen girls, like Lucy (and like I was) who will be faced with changes and changing in their lives. This book reminds me a little bit, in its treatment of a girl coming to terms with an ill loved one, Saving Francesca by Melina Marchetta.
Connections:
- To valuing older generations and what they can teach younger ones about life, experiences, and history
- To Alzheimer’s disease and other brain disorders