Summary from Goodreads:
Growing up in the shadows cast by two world wars, Annabelle
has lived a mostly quiet, steady life in her small Pennsylvania town. Until the
day new student Betty Glengarry walks into her class. Betty quickly reveals
herself to be cruel and manipulative, and while her bullying seems isolated at
first, things quickly escalate, and reclusive World War I veteran Toby becomes
a target of her attacks. While others have always seen Toby’s strangeness,
Annabelle knows only kindness. She will soon need to find the courage to stand
as a lone voice of justice as tensions mount.
Review:
This book was such a pleasant surprise. The good reviews for
this one have been piling up. The book came highly recommended by a coworker
who knows the author. The author lives on Cape Cod. The local papers have been
singing its praises, but so have the New York Times and various other bigger
fish. I knew it would be good, but I wasn’t expecting to love it so much.
I’m not generally a big historical fiction fan, particularly
with middle grade. So, despite the high praise, I wasn’t expecting to love this
as much as I did. Thankfully, it
was hard not to love this. The writing was beautiful, the characters were
spot-on, the setting was fantastic, and I can understand why reviewers are
comparing this to To Kill a Mockingbird.
The plot is actually rather simple. It’s about bullies and
standing up to them. It’s about doing what you know is to be right, despite how
easy it is to do the wrong thing. Annabelle is strong, intelligent, and the
best kind of main character. She’s willing to suffer bullying, so her brothers
won’t have to. She defends people who everyone else is so willing to judge
without knowing. She stands up for the little guy.
I also love Anabelle’s family. It’s so nice to read a middle
grade story where the family is not only present, but good people. I loved how
tough her mom was, and how honest her father was. I even loved her snobby aunt.
Seriously, each character felt like a real person. And the setting was
gorgeous. I can close my eyes now, days after finishing this book, and still
picture Wolf Hollow.
To top this all off, this book also just felt so relevant in
today’s news. This book covers it all: hate, mental illness, war vets, PTSD,
gun violence, xenophobia, and even a bit of police brutality. The book covers
these things in a light, in the background, type of way where no lesson is
necessarily jammed down your throat and you don’t even realize these topics are
all addressed until you’re thinking about the story days later. I wouldn’t have
had it any other way.
A lot of these tougher topics aren’t thoroughly addressed in
an outright way, and I liked this. The author lets the reader decide, think
about, and address these topics on their own terms. Yet, at the same time, things
aren’t sugar coated either. The story was sad enough to cause a few tears from
me. And while the main characters learned a very important lesson at the end,
there was no super charming, Disney happily ever after. The outcome for many
plotlines was sad. This felt plausible and true too. And this in itself was
another lesson: the things you do and say are important and not everything can
be fixed and solved with no loss or injury.
All in all, I found this to be a remarkably strong story. It
was well written, well thought out, and well put together. The setting and
characters were particularly strong. The plot was a simple one, handled
eloquently. Some tough topics are covered and it does get rather sad at points.
This being said, I think most middle grade readers can handle it. I definitely recommend
it to fans of To Kill a Mockingbird.
I see this one winning awards. I give it a 10/10.
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