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| Cover credit: Simon and Schuster |
EXTRA CREDIT
by Andrew Clements
review by MFW
Andrew Clements (the author of this book) is known for writing stories about students at schools. In Extra Credit, you might notice how he makes you feel like you’re in a school, with things happening around you. He knows a lot of things about a school, and what goes on, that you might not know, as a student or a parent. This is probably because Andrew was an English teacher before he was a writer. He lost that job and brought his writing talent to life after a while, making many picture books, writing the books: Frindle, Lost and Found, No Talking, and of course, Extra Credit, as just a few examples of the many books he wrote.
This book is about two children in school, writing pen pal letters to each other across the world: Abby Carson lives in Illinois, and Sadeed Bayat and his sister Amira live in Afghanistan. Abby doesn’t like homework and hasn’t been doing it, making her get bad grades. She’s going to get left back, unless she can get extra credit. Abby has to write to another student in a different country of her choice.
Abby chose Afghanistan because she loves climbing, and Afghanistan has a lot of mountains, where as Illinois is very flat, with mostly farmland, and the forest by Abby’s house.
Sadeed, being the best at English in his class, was chosen to write a pen pal letter back to Abby, but a boy writing to a girl is considered improper, so it was decided that he was to help his sister Amira write the letter. Eventually, Sadeed told Abby that he was helping with the letters.
They became friends, but soon the letters had to stop. This is because many people in Afghanistan don’t like America. Also, a lot of people are mad about the letters, and the fact that Sadeed is helping writing them (with Amira).
Sadeed and Abby are both disappointed, but they understand why people are wanting them to stop.
Extra Credit is a story of inspiration, friendship, courage, hard work, sadness, desperation, annoying little sisters, and difference of opinion. It is a very unique book, and is written well, capturing a sort of school feeling, one very engaging way that Andrew likes to write a lot of his books.
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| Cover credit: Alfred A. Knopf |
Wonder
By R.J. Palacio
Review by JG
Wonder is not a school bus, but takes the readers on a realistic fictional journey to school. August Pullman, who was homeschooled through fourth grade, felt nervous about joining a mainstream classroom. To make things even harder, he was worried about how the kids would react to his unusual facial features (August has a genetic syndrome that causes facial deformities). He is relieved to survive his first week in fifth grade at Beecher Prep, a private school, only to find that the boy who was kind to him, had bad-mouthed him to try to fit in. Later, he finds true friendship and acceptance in his new surroundings.
R.J. Palacio was inspired to write Wonder when she saw her own children’s negative reaction to another child with a disfigured face. She wanted to help children understand that all people experience life in a similar way, regardless of their disability or deformity. In order to show how August’s family and schoolmates perceive events in the story, the author shifts perspective, retelling the same story events through multiple characters. Throughout the book, the characters quarrel and face troubles, but in the end, all heals up in this eventful book that tells a tale of true friendship, standing up to bullies, and the fact that everyone has similar insecurities.
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| Cover credit: Penguin Random House |
Mr. Lemoncello’s Library Olympics
From the “Lemoncello” series, volume two
By Chris Grabenstein
Review by ES
Chris Grabenstein, bestselling author of the Lemoncello series, continues the realistic fiction literary adventure of a group of seventh graders with Mr. Lemoncello’s Library Olympics.
Mr. Lemoncello’s Library Olympics, sequel to Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library brings back suspenseful competitions, futuristic inventions, and competitive characters. In the first book Kyle and his team were invited inside a wondrous library owned by Mr. Lemoncello, the great game maker. By solving puzzling puzzles before the others can, Kyle and his teammates escape the library. Now Kyle Keeley and his teammates, Sierra the bookworm, Akimi the engineer, and Miguel the library lover, are stepping in again for Mr. Luigi Lemoncello’s Library Olympics. A grand prize is awaiting the winners: free college.
Teams all over the nation are coming to compete, including a girl named Majory Maulder who memorized ten sections of the Dewey Decimal System before going to preschool. Can Kyle and his friends beat Marjory, her team, and other teams?
Beyond the challenges of trying to win the Library Olympics, Kyle finds that books and encyclopedias have be missing from the library, which interferes with the games. Now Kyle has to solve the puzzling mystery and prove that he is the true champion of the library. Can Kyle and his teammates stop a mysterious person from stealing books and disturbing the Olympics before it’s too late?
