A Summer to Die

A Summer to Die by Lois Lowry
Bantam Books
1979
Realistic Fiction
I.L. 5 and up
120 pages

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I. Synopsis- Molly and Meg’s father needs to finish his book. Because he is a professor at a college, he rarely gets any peace and quiet to finish it in. So, to the shock of Molly and Meg, they move to the country where Molly and Meg must share a room. Before this, they have never shared a room. Molly is one of the popular types and thus she makes friends quickly at the new school while Meg is the odd one out. She befriends Will Banks, the owner of the land and houses. He is an elderly man whose wife died some years before. He and Meg become close friends and after he finds out that she is a great photographer he makes a deal with her to teach him how to take pictures. Things seem to be going well for awhile until Meg wakes up in the middle of the night. She calls out to Molly who answers in an odd voice. She tells Meg to go get their parents. When they come in, they find Molly bleeding profusely from the nose. After many tests and “experiments”, Meg finds out that her sister has acute myelogenous leukemia. On top of that, the family living in the house behind them is expecting a baby and they are going to deliver it themselves and have asked that Meg be there for the delivery. Molly is really looking forward to the baby, yet, at the time of the labor, Molly is back in the hospital, which her parents say that she’ll never leave. Meg takes pictures of the delivery.

II. Evaluation of the Work as Literature- I think young adults would be able to easily buy into this, for similar situations such as the one that is presented in this book are all across the Untied States. Because diseases are attacking children younger and younger, this book is very real and relevant to young adults nowadays.

III. Personal Comments- This book was a very good book. Yet, at the same time it wasn’t the greatest book I’ve ever read. The ending seemed to have quite a bit of plot manipulation to sugar-coat things. That was the main part that really didn’t make the book for me.