ALL THE SMALL WONDERFUL THINGS — Review

Thought for the Day:

“Get it down. Take chances. It may be bad, but it’s the only way you can do anything really good.”
~ William Faulkner ~

Gifts for My Writer Friends:

It’s time to query. HERE is a great post from Rebecca Moody posting on Writer’s Rumpus with Evergreen Advice for Entering the Query Trenches.

Ooooo. Book titles. They are pretty darn important. I am struggling with one right now. HERE is a great post by John Howell posting at The Story Empire Blog with A Discussion on Book Titles — How Do We Select Them?

Some things bear repeating. HERE Janice Hardy has a post about something every writer who has been at it for a while should know cold, but sometimes we take our eye off the ball and forget the obvious. It’s good to have reminders. She has Three Questions to Get to the Heart of Your Story.

It’s been a quiet week here. Every six months, I have to have a series of four infusions to keep my auto-immune disorder at bay, and last week I had my first for this series. I immediately got an energy boost and stopped being so tired. I’m not sure if it is entirely the infusions though, because we are finally having an end to the hot Sacramento summer, which is such a blessing. It is really cooling off every night, which makes for good sleeping weather. We are coming into my favorite season. I really love fall, and in this area, we usually have a really long fall with trees that show colors for weeks and weeks. I can hardly wait. I hope you are at the end of summer where you are and enjoying some early autumn weather.

I got an email from the publicist at Candlewick Press recently with some middle-grade offerings for review. I chose two and finished reading the first one this morning. That is the book I want to tell you about today. It is ALL THE SMALL WONDERFUL THINGS by Kate Foster. I have noticed over the last couple of years, we are seeing more and more books written by Australian writers, and this is one. What attracted it to me was that it is a story about a boy and his dog and the very special relationship they have. I am a sucker for a dog story. This is a really sweet one.

Alex is 11 years old and worries about having to start middle school in the next school year. He is comfortable at Jessop Lakes Primary School, or at least as comfortable as an autistic boy can be. For the most part, his teachers and classmates are aware of Alex’s issues and what he needs to do to deal with them. Sometimes he has to be by himself or he needs to cover his ears to shut out loud sounds. He seldom makes eye contact, which can be off-putting. And Alex doesn’t feel like he has any friends, and he really would like to. Well, he certainly has one friend — his sweet dog Kevin is his very best friend. Kevin is smart and is really good company for Alex when he’s home. His dad is gone on a long-term job, but Mum and Alex’s older brother Ned take good care of Alex, although sometimes Ned can be a bit of a pain. Other than playing with Kevin, Alex spends most of his time drawing or playing video games. He feels if he could just make the next level of the game, a classmate, Jared, would be his friend. Or if Alex could run faster and help his team make districts, or if he could win a trophy at the upcoming dog show, or something. He just wants to have a friend. When new neighbors move into the house down the street, there is a boy Alex’s age who also has a dog and knows a lot about the video game Alex plays. This holds promise.

Kate Foster has written a really sweet story, but the most amazing thing about the book is how she writes Alex’s story in a first-person narrative that truly gives a picture of what it must be like to be autistic. There is a breathless quality and a stridency to the writing that will put readers squarely in Alex’s head. It is an amazing accomplishment. It is a sympathetic portrayal, yet it isn’t maudlin or didactic. This is a book from which young readers can really learn empathy without feeling like they are being preached at. I hope a lot of kids will find this book. It deserves to be widely read.

Please don’t forget to check for other Marvelous Middle-Grade Monday posts at Greg Pattridge’s blog HERE.