Twelve-year-old Maren is sure theater camp isn’t for her. I thought that the book was a little on the boring side in the beginning until about halfway through the book and that there was just so much slow pacing throughout the read.īetter Nate Than Ever meets The Parker Inheritance in this heartwarming mystery about finding your people and accepting others as they are. I did have trouble remembering all of the characters, there were a lot, and reading an ebook made it hard to flip to the front of the book to check who was who. However, I knew it wasn’t going to be so good for me when the book started off with 2 full pages of characters. I also appreciate all of the useful material at the end of the book! I also enjoyed the riddles even though I didn’t understand them.

The story was interesting and it kept me reading until the very end to figure out the whodunit. The book had pretty decent character development and world building. Review: I enjoyed this summer camp read! I loved that it was a theater camp and that the mystery was Shakespeare themed. When Maren connects the clues to Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, she and her new friends are off searching through lighting booths, orchestra pits and costume storages, discovering the trail and dodging camp counselors. But they’re not the only ones searching for the ring, and with the growing threat of camp closing forever, they’re almost out of time.

But when a prank goes wrong, Maren gets drawn into the hunt for a diamond ring that, legend has it, is linked to the camp’s namesake, Charlotte “Charlie” Goodman, a promising director in Blacklist Era Hollywood. Theater camp is for loud, confident, artsy people: people like her older sister, Hadley-the last person Maren wants to think about-and her cinema-obsessed, nonbinary bunkmate, Theo. Synopsis: Twelve-year-old Maren is sure theater camp isn’t for her. Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers Domestic abuse is alluded to in the book and there are a couple of brief scenes of romance. There is a couple of kidnapping scenes, along with mentions of war and scenes of gore (vomit and some slight blood) and violence (assault on minors). Depression and parental death is mentioned briefly. There is mentions of religion and religious trauma.

Recommended For…: middle grade readers, mystery, LGBT, thriller, theater, summer campĪge Relevance: 12+ (homophobia, transphobia, antisemitism, religion, religious trauma, depression, parental death, kidnapping, war, gore, violence, domestic abuse, romance)Įxplanation of Above: There are some homophobia, transphobia, and antisemetic comments made to characters in the book. Thanks! All opinions are my own.ĭiversity: Non-binary character, Wheelchair user character, Trans character, Gay character, Queer characters Disclaimer: I received this e-arc from the publisher.

Twelfth by Janet Key