Module 1 LS5623: Seventeenth Summer

Book cover image from Simon and Schuster web site
SEVENTEENTH SUMMER
1. BIBLIOGRAPHY
Daly, Maureen. 1968. SEVENTEENTH SUMMER. New York, NY: Pocket Books. ISBN 0671619314

2. PLOT SUMMARY
This book, considered to be one of the first young adult novels, tells the story of Angie Morrow, a seventeen year old girl who, after finishing high school, is spending the summer preparing to start college in the fall. At the beginning of the summer, she meets Jack Duluth, star basketball player, whose family owns a bakery. Through boat rides and cokes at the corner drugstore, Angie falls in love for the first time and chronicles the experience, knowing that “never again would there be anything quite as wonderful as that seventeenth summer!”

3. CRITICAL ANALYSIS

This book is the stereotypical “shy girl meets popular boy from wrong side of tracks”. What makes this story of first love so appealing is the innocence of the time. This story happens in the 1940’s, and barely are there even kisses shared. It seems more like a young adult novel of today when smoking and drinking occur, but that was more acceptable during that time then a young lady making herself readily available to a boy, as Angie’s sister, Lorraine does.
While the story is written from Maureen’s view point, the age of the story makes it feel f as if the protagonist is older than seventeen, even though Daly was in high school and college when she wrote this novel
. The copy I checked out from the library had a cover that had been redone to make the novel appear more contemporary, showing a young couple reclining in a field together. The sweetness of the story would appeal more to a fifth or sixth grade student, rather than the seventeen year olds that the title implies.

4. REVIEW EXCERPTS
On the Amazon.com site, Kiddy, a high school student from Northern California, wrote:
“Earlier this summer I picked up Seventeenth Summer and fell in love with the illustrious characters Daly has perfectly painted into her novel. It surprised me, however, when I checked the copyright date and noticed it was published in the early 1940's. I had absolutely no idea, considering the way love is truly timeless and this beautiful novel proves all of the above. As a high school student, I can completely relate with the giddy feelings of first love for a teenage girl and this novel perfectly portrays all of the emotions, trials and even tragedies that are intricate into such a powerful emotion.”

From Publishers Weekly: “College-bound Angie Morrow falls in love for the first time in the perennially popular Seventeenth Summer by Maureen Daly (1942), written while the author was still in college herself. Diary Like entries depict the trials and tribulations of adolescent amour.”