Our own little paradise

Gr 3--7--There are 54 days in summer break and Nora (race unspecified, assumed white) needs to fill them all. She's the only person in her sixth-grade class who isn't planning on going on vacation, so when it comes time to declare her plans, she panics and says she's going to "the tropics" so she can impress the popular kids whose acceptance she is desperate for. As her lie snowballs into posting fake photos on Instagram and telling her ailing mother she's busy with an imaginary friend, she finds herself gravitating toward Wilmer, the new, equally poor, equally uncool kid in her class. Together, they build their own version of the tropics, but their creation may not be any more stable than a sandcastle in a storm. This is a Norwegian import that translates well for American audiences, though the intense pressure for a nice vacation and the classes Nora's mother takes before getting a job are based in trends that are obvious in Norway, but possibly confusing abroad. Nora narrates in short chapters that help move the story quickly in a way that will benefit developing readers. While its cast of characters is small, it's well crafted, though Nora and her mom are really the only people who grow and change perceptibly. VERDICT A short but sweet novel on struggling with social awkwardness and the importance of friendship.--Gina Elbert

Nora's summer vacation turns out to be the best--and also the worst--ever. Narrator Nora's sixth grade year--her first in a new school--ends with the disclosure that her classmates from the middle-class neighborhood of Solvang Heights have summer plans for travel with their families. Put on the spot, an ashamed Nora lies and says she's going to the tropics. Only Nora and Wilmer, the boy who dropped by on the last day of school to meet the class he'll join in the fall, live in Chaplin Court, a low-income apartment block dubbed Craplin Court. Nora's reluctance to befriend Wilmer--he's not cool or handsome in the way that her crush, Marcus, is--gradually eases as she struggles with the long stretch of summer, lack of friends, and an unemployed mother who seems to sleep all the time. Wilmer shares with Nora his discovery of the long-unoccupied former apartment complex caretaker's flat, and the two resourcefully create a summer getaway they do their best to turn into a tropical escape. Evidence of the caretaker's long-ago romance and heartbreak captures Nora's and Wilmer's imaginations. The transformation of the flat and the innocent playing house seem magical until the class mean girls find a way to bully Nora's happiness out of her. Hints of the Norwegian setting come through in this translation that sheds light on socio-economic disparities. The resolution is satisfyingly happy. Absorbing relationship drama with a convincing protagonist. (Fiction. 9-12) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.