Book Reviews

Voice Lessons by Marcy Telles

Reviewed by Marlene Cullen. The set-up of Voice Lessons by Marcy Telles: Wham! The ball hit Phoebe squarely on her 12-year-old rump . . . “Sor-ree,” said an unfamiliar voice behind her. [Phoebe] was used to being made the butt of jokes, but this seemed a bit literal, even for her somewhat crudely oriented classmates. A hand dangled suddenly in front of her face, and looking up, Phoebe found it attached to a person she’d never seen before. Having spent her entire life in this neighborhood and knowing pretty much everyone in her class, a new face was enough of a novelty to capture her fractured attention. . . . It was not easy to be a small, unorthodontured, bookish sort of person (who had not had a nose job) in a big New York junior high school where everyone was in a permanent state of competition. Right away, I…