Matilda (six), Frances (eleven), and Elizabeth (fifteen) live at "the end of the world" -- a tiny suburb of summer houses near Sydney, Australia. In fall 1954, the neighboring house becomes the hideaway of Australia's defected Soviet ambassador. His secret residence there, and the shadow of the Cold War and the H-bomb, create a context of uncertainty and investigation in which each sister faces her own secrets, as well as the alarming absence of a beloved father traumatized by war. Dubosarsky offers three parallel coming-of-age moments in the lives of three very different sisters, evoking the concerns and sensibilities of each with affection, humor, and insight. She captures place and period with the heightened awareness of a dream: the waning summer, waves sounding "like people shouting, wanting her attention," even a breakfast of fried eggs staring up like "two huge moist yellow eyes" leaps into significance under her pen. In lucid, poetic prose she explores what is at the heart of her story: the intense feeling and acute but partial perceptions of children struggling with a world under threat. This memorable, luminous work is a vital addition to the growing constellation of recent Cold War novels and a stellar read on its own.

deirdre f. baker