Fiction

Review by Richview Youth Advisory Group member Elisa

Phoebe Farris was born into a family of rock stars. Her mother, Meg, founded Shelter, the American band famous for their summer cult classics, but now spends her time forging spiky metal sculptures in the garage. Her now-estranged father, Kieran, also was a founder of Shelter, but left the band when he left his wife and daughters to start his solo career as a singer and a music producer. And her sister, Luna, has dropped out of college to start touring the States with her own incredibly successful band, Luna and the Moons.

But Phoebe, a budding poet, has not been bitten by the stardom bug. Instead, she is preparing for a summer of change. She’s about to leave her mom, her (now distant) best friend, and her home to fly to New York to visit her sister, who she has barely talked to in months. But as everyone knows, anything can happen during a summer in New York.

Janet McNally makes an effective use of flashbacks, allowing the reader to draw parallels between the respective lives of Phoebe, Luna, and a teenaged Meg, and highlighting their similarities, not their differences. All three women struggle with the idea of family and how it may or may not align with their life ambitions.

Girls in the Moon is an effective coming-of-age story about finding your place both within your family and in the world. It’s not dramatic or action-packed, but it’s certainly not boring either. The story strikes a quiet balance, and while it won’t satisfy every reader, a large majority will take comfort when reading it.