It's been a long time since a book has transported me so completely. Has taken me so deeply into myself that I become oblivious to the world around me and my head spins with disconnection when I try to regain awareness. Just me and the book, and nothing else. I started reading and was supposed to stop because life was still going on around me, but I didn't. I couldn't find my way back. So life moved on without me until I finished the book. Now I must figure out how to catch up, but that's okay. It was worth stopping at a special place for a while.
After the death of Jack’s mother, he is suddenly uprooted from his home and placed in a military boarding school. There, he befriends Early, a boy who reads pi as a story and collects newspaper clippings of a great black bear in the mountains nearby. When they unexpectedly find themselves alone at school, they embark on a journey on the Appalachian Trail in search of the bear. Along the way, they meet people who figure into the pi story Early tells. They both discover things about themselves and others in their lives on this great adventure.
Auggy was born with a facial deformity that has always prevented him from attending public school. But now, after many surgeries, he is able to be in the 5th grade. He is just an ordinary kid with an extraordinary face. How can he convince his classmates that he is just like them despite what he looks like?
I'd recommend it without hesitation to most middle grade readers, girls or boys, even those who may not normally pick up realistic fiction.
Lacy believes that magic and science can work side by side. She is a skilled botanist that can harness the power of plants. When her father dies, she tries to stay with her step-mother that believes in good and healing magic. But she always feel the pull of her persuasive and powerful mother who brings out the darkness in her, stripping everything light and kind. Her mother forces Lacy to accompany her to Sacramento, and it is not long before the old darkness resurfaces.
Everyone (literally) in the small town (pop. 3,000) of Healey, Texas, knows the truth about Alice Franklin. Well, they know what's been determined by the collective consciousness of the town's population as the truth, which is virtually the same thing. Everyone believes it, so it must be so. Everyone treats Alice as if it's true, so the end result is the same.
Calvin was born on the day the final Calvin and Hobbes comic strip was published. His parents claim that they didn’t name him after it, that’s it’s just a fluke. They don’t understand what’s the big deal about his grandfather putting a stuffed tiger named Hobbes into baby Calvin’s crib, either. Calvin understands the significance. He is special: eternally bound to Bill Watterson, the creator of the beloved comic strip.
Then his mom accidentally washes Hobbes to death and everything changes.
A boy named Pip lives on the English marshes as an apprentice for a Blacksmith named Joe (his sister's husband). Pip is supposed to be a common boy just like his family, but he gets the opportunity to meet a family of higher class. Pip's ideology of being common changes into shame for his social class, and he is stuck between family and image. He soon has the opportunity to embark on his Great Expectations without knowing who his benefactor is, and is struck by the harsh society of London.
Ana is the perfect daughter, student and big sister. Over the course of her high school career she has built the perfect resume through test scores, an exemplary GPA and a host of extracurricular activities and volunteer opportunities including being the captain of her school’s quiz bowl team.
Good, but not great. Published thirteen years ago, it doesn't quite hold up today. Ginny is unbelievably pathetic throughout most of the story, and only toward the Hollywood-like ending does she-surprise-develop some confidence. Normally I love pathetic people because I can relate to their insecurity, but Ginny's character is a tad too two-dimensional, not a fully fleshed out character worthy of my concern.
