Take It from the Top

Eowyn Becker lives for theater summer camp, where she can follow in her deceased stage star mother’s footsteps and finally hang out with her long-distance best friend Jules. The northern Wisconsin camp also provides welcome relief from the stress of her Broadway star older brother’s career and her distracted, grieving father. As 13-year-olds, Eowyn and Jules get to participate in the musical production at the end of the summer, and as the camp’s best singer, Eowyn is gunning for a leading role, despite her stage fright that’s been getting worse. And Jules has seemed distant lately, even cold. Eowyn doesn’t understand why but worries that it’s because of a disastrous incident during last year’s show. When the two are cast as leads in Wicked, Eowyn hopes that working together will help mend their friendship, but the rift only deepens. The vibrant and exceptionally rendered setting makes for a compelling backdrop against which layered character building unravels. Swinarski (What Happened to Rachel Riley?) intersperses Eowyn’s conversational narration—suffused with theater-obsessed sensibilities—with sympathetic third person chapters that cover the events of previous summers, offering context and history to the white-cued girls’ relationship. Ages 8–12. Agent: Alexander Slater, Sanford J. Greenburger Assoc. (Nov.)