Fool's Hill

Everyone has to go over fool's hill, or so they say in sleepy little Preston, Va. For Libby Burke, 14, the process starts with an embarrassing tumble off the school bus. She realizes that the world naturally divides itself into Fallers and Laughers, and she desperately wants to be a Laugher for once. Then Rosalyn and her sister Linda breeze into town in a red Mustang convertible. Rosalyn is what most parents would call a Bad Influence, but she beguiles Libby with her devil-may-care attitude and more cosmopolitan ways. Hall ( Dixie Storms ) brings Libby to life with a funny and honest first-person narrative that recalls the works of Paula Danziger. Libby's discoveries about the difference between being good and looking good are on target, and with her the reader will come to see that ``it's not how you go over fool's hill, it's how you come down it.'' Ages 12-up. (Oct.)