The bare bones of the story seem simple, even simplistic. Melissa is a dark haired, awkward, friendless 16-year-old. She's unsure, unconfident and socially immature. She's only recently begun menstruating. In contrast, Julietta is tall, blond, worldly and self-assured. She 'appears at the school one day, conquers it the next'. But Julietta chooses Melissa as best friend, something neither she nor her peers can quite comprehend.

These two Sydney girls hang out together, talking endlessly, discussing the profound and the meaningless. But both Julietta and the reader squirm with tension created by such a dissonant friendship. As do the respective sets of parents, particularly when the girls are seen dancing forehead to forehead. Julietta's mother is afraid they spend too much time together. Julietta's mother has seen Heavenly Creatures!

The brooding, spasming presence of emerging sexuality permeates the book. Melissa is acutely aware of Julietta but can't isolate or articulate the power of her attraction to her. Julietta manipulates her sexual allure with aplomb, ensnaring girls and boys alike, and seemingly, a young teacher. In a pivotal scene, Melissa watches Julietta entangled with a boy and flees, vomiting in response.

Suddenly, Melissa acts and the friendship fractures, taking with it Melissa's fragile sense of worth. But is it, was it, all that it seemed?

While Walker's plot promises little different to many such tales of adolescent angst, the style and delivery lifts it far above. Her text is lyrical at times, with moments of poetic structure, then leaps into sparse staccato rhythms. It tells as much by what it leaves out, or whispers, as what it includes. Initially the reader is beguiled by the absence of first person narration. We think we see more than Melissa's point of view, but have we?

The beauty and, for some perhaps the frustration, of Camphor Laurel is its lack of definition. It never pins anything down. Everything is personal perception, suggestion, tufts of action and imagery. The exact nature of the girls' feelings for each other is not clear, but remain swirls of emotion and undisclosed energy. The adults in the book remain shadowy bit players, often nameless and ephemeral. Notwithstanding this, the book has a very active plot that gathers you into the swirl.

This book is a step up from The Year of Freaking Out, itself a terrific book. It is sophisticated, lyrical, but drafted within the real-life intensity of adolescent life. I can't wait for Walker's next effort.