A child prodigy is expected to turn out a second publishable work of writing, but also to move into her teenage years with the maturity she exhibited all through childhood. Some parental double-talk and casual allusions remain maddeningly oblique-both to the heroine, Valerie, and to readers. Yet Terris writes rivetingly of Valerie's heartfelt confusion in the face of so many changes-ordinary and extraordinary-that readers will root for her to the last.