Wildlife by Fiona Wood

This is told in alternating chapters/voices of Sib and Lou.  They are doing their one semester in outdoor camp for school.  This means gardening, cooking, hiking and such things.  There are strict rules about boys and girls intermingling.  But they find ways.  Sib is cautiously interested and with her friend Holly to help has some first romantic experiences with Ben.  Holly's motives may not be in the best interest in her on again off again friendship with Sib. Sib has always been friends with nerdy, self assured Michael but does not realize the depth of his feelings for her.  Lou in camp just to get through after experiencing a tragic loss of her friend, slowly comes out of her shell, becomes friends with first Michael then Sib and understands all too well the personalities of the girls in her cabin and of Ben and his crowd and of Michael.  I think that Sib and Lou did too much analyzing of their own situations and personalities.  But, here is a cast of likeable characters growing and changing and maturing while not always doing what is right but coming out ok anyway.  And, I liked this story.  It is very real.  I liked the foreign (for me in the U.S.) setting with references to wallaby's and exotic trees and landscape.  This is decent realistic fiction, very unlike the last couple of books I read.
JDW2/15