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Summary
Summary
It's all good . . . and lucky Phoebe Avery plans to celebrate by throwing an end-of-the-year bash with her four closest friends. Everything will be perfect--from the guest list to the fashion photographer to the engraved invitations. The only thing left to do is find the perfect dress . . . until Phoebe goes from having it all to hiding all she's lost.
Phoebe's older sisters warn her to keep the family's crisis totally secret. Unfortunately, her alpha-girl best friend looks increasingly suspicious, and Phoebe's crush starts sending seriously mixed signals. Phoebe tries hard to keep smiling, but when her mother is humiliated in Neiman Marcus while buying Phoebe that perfect dress and her father decides to cancel her party, she panics. How far will she go to keep up her image as a lucky girl?
With lucky, Rachel Vail begins a powerful sisterhood trilogy, comprised of one book for each of the three fascinating Avery sisters, with all their secrets laid bare during the year that completely changes their lives. Phoebe is the youngest; her story combines first love and flip-flops, friendship and sisterhood, humor and tears. Breezy, witty, and poignant, lucky is Rachel Vail at her breathtaking best.
Author Notes
Rachel Vail, born on July 25, 1966 in Manhattan. She is an author of children's and young adult books. She grew up in New Rochelle, New York, and is a graduate of Georgetown University. Her debut novel Wonder won an Editor's Choice award from Booklist in 1991, and in 1992 her second novel, Do-Over, won that award also. She has authored several series which include Friendship Ring, Mama Rex and T, If We Kiss, and Avery Sisters Trilogy.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (5)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 6-8-Rich girls, extravagant spending, and an elaborate party sound like the recipe for yet another in the long series of spoiled-rotten-girl books that have been abundant in the past few years. Luckily, this one is different. The first in a trilogy about the Avery sisters, it focuses on the youngest, Phoebe, whose picture-perfect family is facing a challenge. Mr. Avery is a kindergarten teacher, and it is clear that Mrs. Avery's income maintains the family's lifestyle: cars, housekeeper, pool, vacations, and a nanny who spends a lot of her time chauffeuring the girls around. When a business deal falls apart and threatens the family's financial security, loyalties, priorities, and relationships are brought into question. What rings so true is Phoebe's complete ignorance about money. Her family has it, they've always had it, and they never talk about it. It is a real transformation in the eighth grader's life when all of a sudden her parents start talking about what things cost and what they can (and can't) afford. Readers will find that the middle school characters act appropriately for their ages and the parents, while peripheral, are essential to their children's sense of self as young adults. Kindness and understanding emerge in unexpected, fresh, and satisfying ways, and readers will be looking forward to finding out what lies ahead for the Avery family.-Genevieve Gallagher, Murray Elementary School, Charlottesville, VA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Vail (You, Maybe) again demonstrates a penetrating insight into the concerns of young teen girls, this time upending the conventions of the rich-girl novel. In the first of a trilogy about three sisters, 14-year-old Phoebe, the appealing narrator, and her two older siblings have been coached to view themselves and their eber-successful investor mother as Valkyries ("Nobody--nothing--can intimidate us. We will never back down; we will never surrender," their mother tells them over breakfast). Less a Valkyrie than a people-pleaser, Phoebe has joined her best friends to plan a lavish eighth-grade graduation party, for which Phoebe has picked out a Vera Wang gown. But when her mother gets fired abruptly for what could be shady dealings, Phoebe is forced to think about money for the first time, and to wonder how much effect it has on her friendships and popularity. Vail gets the relationships exactly right, from the shifting twosomes among the sisters to the changing attitudes among the eighth-grade friends and their parents, and most especially, the shifts in behavior within her protagonist. Readers will absorb this in one fell swoop. Ages 12-up. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Horn Book Review
Everyone calls Phoebe "lucky"--her family is upper-class, she's part of the A-list group at school, and she and her friends are throwing the party of the year. Then her businesswoman mom is fired, and Phoebe and her sisters are forced to confront some tough financial realities. Phoebe is entitled but still entirely sympathetic in this strong first book of a planned trilogy. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
Phoebe, "pretty, popular [and] rich," knows that she is lucky. Now 14 and about to graduate eighth grade, she's the youngest of the Avery women, Valkyries all: her beautiful, high-powered mother and her two older sisters. Then, just when Phoebe and her closest girlfriends are planning an exorbitantly expensive graduation party, Phoebe's luck runs out. She discovers that her mother, the main breadwinner in her family, has been fired, blamed for a big investment gone bad. Afraid to tell her acquisitive friends that she can no longer afford her share of the party, Phoebe tries to manipulate her way out, pretending that the party has become too overblown and blaming her best friend for the lapse. The story, which has a touching ending and something to say about the connections between friendship, trust and money, wants to have it both ways, however--for Phoebe to learn the lesson that being lucky in life isn't about stuff, it's about having family and friends who will stand by you--without forcing her to sacrifice anything real. (Fiction. 12 & up) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Fourteen-year-old Phoebe had never really considered the role that wealth and popularity played in her lucky life until both are threatened after her mom suddenly loses her job. Now her parents can't afford to pay for Phoebe's expensive eighth-grade graduation party or the green Vera Wang dress she was dreaming of wearing to it. At first, she tries to convince her sisters and four best friends that everything is still all good. But after some tearful soul-searching, Phoebe faces up to the truth, and she discovers that she's still rich in friendship and also lucky in love. This entertaining, albeit predictable, first volume in a planned trilogy will appeal to Meg Cabot and Maureen Johnson groupies, as well as fans of Michael Simmons' Pool Boy (2003). Vail's insightful characterizations of teen girls and their shifting loyalties is right on target, and her insertion of several uncomfortably realistic moments, such as when Phoebe's mom's credit card is publicly confiscated, will leave readers squirming in embarrassed sympathy.--Hubert, Jennifer Copyright 2008 Booklist