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High school begins and nothing is the same for Beatrice Bunson, not even her best friend. The new Nan doesn't hang out with Bea after school snacking on Twizzlers and Yoo-hoo-instead she's running for student council and going to parties and ditching Bea at lunch. The boys who were gross in middle school are getting surprisingly polite, while Bea's crush seems more distant than ever, and... More

High school begins and nothing is the same for Beatrice Bunson, not even her best friend. The new Nan doesn't hang out with Bea after school snacking on Twizzlers and Yoo-hoo-instead she's running for student council and going to parties and ditching Bea at lunch. The boys who were gross in middle school are getting surprisingly polite, while Bea's crush seems more distant than ever, and Bea's older sister acts like she's living in a soap opera.

The one good thing is English class, where Beatrice is realizing that Shakespeare has something to say about everything, and nothing in her life is as dramatic as Romeo and Juliet.

But then Nan gets in over her head in her new social life and it's up to Bea to restore her friend's reputation-and she may need to make a few new friends to pull it off. Fortunately, nothing is the same in high school, and the girl who's so perfect she always gets chosen to read Juliet's lines might also be the girl to provide a helping hand in a crisis. And the annoying boys from Bea's English class can also be fun to hang out with. And the kind of nerdy guy that Beatrice meets at her grandmother's retirement home is also definitely cute, and probably dateable.

Cohen unravels Romeo and Juliet with insight and humor, deftly using the thoughts and perceptions of teenagers to unveil the subtleties of the play, as well as the broader lessons on love, family, misunderstandings, and the power of the sonnet that it has to offer. As Beatrice and her classmates-guided by a young teacher who creates an air of camaraderie and confidence among his students-help the reader understand Shakespeare, Shakespeare begins to help these ninth graders understand themselves.

Paula Marantz Cohen is a distinguished professor of English at Drexel University and the author of the novels Suzanne Davis Gets a Life, Jane Austen in Scarsdale or Love, Death and the SATs, and What Alice Knew.

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