Came across this in the little local free library (set up in an old telephone box as it is) and it immediately brought back memories of reading it as a kid. Or having it read to me... the first form teacher at my school read Alex aloud to my class, skipping over the bits where Alex kissed her boyfriend, because surely that was too much for impressionable twelve year olds, lol. (She was quite old so didn't notice when we stole the book off her at recess to read what she wouldn't... and it was extraordinarily tame, to our great disappointment.)

But anyway, this is one of the classics of YA literature in New Zealand. Alex, a fifteen year old swimmer who is training for a shot at the Olympics, gets progressively more overwhelmed by the rest of her life: school work, other extracurriculars, the awkward yet still friendly relationship she has with her rival Maggie, who has her own problems... of course there is success in the end, for both girls, and it remains an appealing, well-written story even decades later. Nice to have a book so focused on girls and athletics, too... more often these types of stories, especially at time of writing, seemed to be directed more to boys.