All posts in Preteens

In the book, Making Waves, Sophomore Katie finds herself lonely and with a lot of extra time on her hands when her best friend moves away. With her sister gone from the house and her mom working long hours, Katie decides she needs a hobby. When she joins the swim teams, she encounters pressures and expectations she didn’t anticipate.

A natural swimmer, Katie has always viewed swimming as something she did “just for fun”. Now with both the coach and the other team mates impressed with her talents, the pressure is on to meet expectations and beyond. When early morning practices and schoolwork begin to take their toll, the other swimmers let Katie in on a few secrets — namely Red Dragon and coffee. When this “pick-me-ups” start losing their effectiveness, Katie wonders how far she’ll have to go to keep her edge.

Flickr by Kristian D.

Meanwhile, Katie is also dealing with drifting apart from her best friend (who recently moved), her family (conflicting schedules) and a possible boyfriend? As in all of Nicole O’Dell Scenarios books, you, as the reader, help Katie decide what to do when she’s faced with a big decision.

My personal take? Another hit from Nicole O’Dell. This book deals with some real-life issues in a way that’s easy to relate to and easy to learn from. I like the way boy-girl relationships were handled in this book much better than in previous Scenario books, though the faith element seemed to be a bit disjointed and not really integrated into Katie’s life. As always, some great talking points for parents and preteens and a big recommendation from me.

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