Request #196

Read a YA book in the late 70s / early 80s.  Remember it was about a teenaged girl – maybe named Julie? maybe an orphan?- who had a best friend and was close to the friend’s Italian family.  There was an older brother in this family named Tony – last name Martone, maybe? – who treated her and scolded her like she was a little sister but ultimately the realize feelings for each other.  I remember the girl quoting a rhyme to him including “…really hairy, his secret weapon’s really scary”…”I  soon found out this …..cat had a nose that knocked me flat.” The Voices of Julie by Joan Oppenheimer solved by Lost Classics reader Sheesh