Despite the predictable plot and characters and the story's pat resolution, [A New and Different Summer] is highly readable and has great appeal in its evocation of a happy, loving family. Not challenging fiction, but lighthearted and fun to read. One unnecessary scene gives the story an ugly flaw. At a baby shower, Katie asks a Negro girl if she is married.

"'I was' came the casual answer. 'I got me two little kids, but right now I ain't got no man'."… The scene and comment are extraneous to the plot and needlessly perpetuate the stereotype of the shiftless Negro. (p. 174)

Emma Kirby, in School Library Journal (reprinted from the May, 1966 issue of School Library Journal, published by R. R. Bowker Co. A Xerox Corporation; copyright © 1966), May, 1966.