A Few Well-Placed Arrows

Joan Bauer is a funny writer. Her prize-winning previous novel, “Squashed,” told of a teen-age girl and her championship pumpkin. In her new book, Thwonk (Delacorte Press: $14.95, 224 pp.; ages 12 and up), what could have been a humdrum Valentine’s Day tale has--with a little help from the supernatural--turned into a first-class comic romance. (The title answers the question, “What is the sound of one cupid’s arrow hitting its target?”) What makes the story even more enjoyable is the full-bodiedness of the central character, a smart, neurotic kid with a flare for self-analysis.

Bauer’s heroine here, high-school senior Alison Jean (A.J.) McCreary, is a combination of romantic lunatic and dedicated soon-to-be-professional photographer. Her life in the wealthy suburb of Crestport, Conn., is a true-to-reality mix of the good, the bad and the ugly. Among the good: her best friend, Trish, a perceptive aspiring psychologist; her loyal black-and-white dog, Stieglitz, barking at evil wherever he sniffs it, and A.J.’s own niftily imaginative photos. The bad? Her failed-photog-turned-ad-exec dad, who rejects her artistic efforts. The ugly? Her batting-zero love life.

At the core of the latter, as Trish figures it, is the irresistible attraction A.J. feels for mega-hunks, regardless of how unattainable--or, underneath the gorgeous, how unappealing--they may be. After an unbroken series of heart-crumblings, she’s still going at it, this time having fallen hopelessly, fruitlessly in love with Peter Terris, acknowledged by all to be the most fabulous guy at Benjamin Franklin High.

Trouble is, Peter is oblivious, being already joined at the hip (and other places) with Julia Hart, the most gorgeous girl at Benjamin Franklin. Enter a cupid named Jonathan, who reluctantly agrees to “thwonk” some of his minute arrows into Peter’s unsuspecting heart for A.J.’s sake.

It’s a tribute to Bauer’s talent that she is able to breathe life into the character of Jonathan the cupid--a flawed angel. (He even admits to having bungled his last teen romance job, but A.J. is too desperate to care.)

Proving once again the wisdom of that old saw, “Be careful of what you ask for, for you may get it,” Jonathan’s few well-placed arrows transform supercilious love object Peter into a cloyingly, annoyingly besotted love-slave. After the initial thrill is gone (a matter of a few short days), A.J. has OD’d on being adored, and begs Jonathan to call off the magic.

The whole time, A.J. is also snapping better and better photos, and falling deeper and deeper in love with her art, a plot thickener that gives this book the kind of substance lacking in most young-adult romances. A satisfying read will be had by all thoroughly modern teen-age readers, who demand more than just syrup in stories of love.

Other fine novels of late: Alden R. Carter’s Dogwolf (Scholastic: $13.95; ages 12 and up), about the difficult summer a half-Metis (Native Canadian-French) teen goes on the modern equivalent of a vision quest. . . . Moriah’s Pond by Ethel Footman Smothers (Knopf: $14; ages 8-13) is a follow-up to the author’s “Down in the Piney Woods,” in which the author detailed the adventures of 10-year-old Annie Rye and other members of her family, black tenant farmers in 1950s Georgia. . . . Best-selling writer Paula Danziger (“The Cat Ate My Gymsuit”) turns to an overseas setting in the light-hearted Thames Doesn’t Rhyme With James (Putnam: $14.95; ages 10-14), in which a teen-age girl departs Newark Airport for London’s Heathrow seeking to broaden both geographic and romantic horizons.