Written In The Stars - Softcover

Lois Duncan is the author of over fifty books, ranging from children's picture books to poetry to adult nonfiction, but is best known for her young adult suspense novels, such as Stranger With My Face and I Know What You Did Last Summer. She has been awarded the Margaret A. Edwards Award, presented by the School Library Journal and the ALA Young Adult Library Services Association for "a distinguished body of adolescent literature." In 2009 she received the Katharine Drexel Award, awarded by the Catholic Library Association "to recognize an outstanding contribution by an individual to the growth of high school and young adult librarianship and literature."

Gr 7 Up—This collection of hard-to-find short stories written at the beginning of Duncan's career in the early 1950s transports readers to another era, one in which marrying one's high school sweetheart was the norm and the chief concern of most young girls was finding the right man with whom to settle down. The cadence and vocabulary evoke the period. "Written in the Stars" features a girl realizing with shock that her high school beau isn't "The One" as they drift apart once he starts college. In "Return," shell-shocked young veteran Bill struggles with readjusting to life back home from the front. "April" deals with the intense sibling rivalry between intelligent but plain Martha Dunning and her glamorous older sister April, who appears to coast by on her good looks. Close-knit families with warm and supportive brother/sister relationships that echo the author's own family are featured in most of the stories. Each entry is appended with a note from the author on where each piece was originally published, her inspiration for it, and what was happening in her life at that time. Perfect for Duncan completists, this collection may spark interesting conversations with teens about how gender roles have changed over the years.—Madigan McGillicuddy, Atlanta-Fulton Public Library, Atlanta, GA