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“My father is talking about skating at the rodeo. And he’s actually going to do it.”
Have you ever started off a summer thinking it’s going to be the worst
of your entire life? That’s the way Peggy Fleming Farrell feels. Her best
friend leaves town, she’s working at a coffee shop inside a gas station,
and she has to either inline skate all over town or ride a bus with a
crazy driver because her parents have taken away her driver’s license.
She’s taking summer-school French class because the teacher is supposed to
be so great–only problem is, he never actually shows up to teach.
Peggy can’t win. She can’t even convince her mother–who’s about to
have a baby–to call her “Fleming” instead of “Peggy.” And she’s stuck
babysitting her little brother and sisters (Torvill, Dean, and Dorothy)
whenever her mother is at work and her father is off at the ice rink,
practicing his figure skating so he can go on tour.
But it’s not
all bad. Really. Fleming quickly finds some new friends to hang out
with–like Denny, her co-worker who’s obsessed with U2, and Charlotte,
whose idea of fun is stealing a golf cart and/or streaking during the
town’s Rodeo Days parade. And then there’s Steve, the guy she’s been
semi-involved with…and his best friend, Mike, who wants to be
semi-involved with her. And then there are Rodeo Days, and the fact her
father’s going to skate a routine in front of the entire town… |
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"Clark juggles more story lines than a circus performer does
bowling pins in this wacky novel. the various elements come together in a
fun-filled,
fever-pitch conclusion."
–Publishers Weekly
Some People Like It a Lot
2004 New
York Public Library Books for the Teen Age
Barnes & Noble Best of
2003 Teen Books
Borders Original Voices selection (2/03)
Junior
Library Guild selection
2004-2005 TAYSHAS Reading List Young Adult
Round Table (Texas Library Association)
What You Might Not Know
I dedicated this book to my father, so I know people are going to wonder: was he a professional or amateur figure skater? Didn’t we see him in the 1968 Olympics, right after Peggy Fleming skated and won the gold medal?
No. He did, however, coach a girls’ ice hockey team. Which is pretty cool.
I passed this closed gas station
in Winner, South Dakota, about 2 months after I’d finished writing
Better Latte Than Never (formerly Frozen Rodeo), which features a place called Gas ‘n Git.
It was August, about 100 degrees, and I’d been camping, which
explains a few things.
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