This book has been on my TBR shelf for a really long time. I believe that I put it on my list a few months after it come out. (In my mind, I was like “2012? That wasn’t so long ago!” And then I remembered that 2012 was four years ago. Oh my goodness…) I do this thing where I’ll add something to my TBR shelf and then I’ll think that because it’s there, I’ll read it sooner than anything else. I’m starting to realize that this is NOT the case. (I’m trying to fix that.) This past semester, I took a children’s literature class and my professor RAVED about the importance of this book. After that, I HAD to pick it up. It took me FOREVER to get through (thank you procrastination :P) but I’m really glad that I read it because I think that it is so very important.

I want to be a teacher when I grow up, and because of this, I’ve been reading a lot of children’s lit and middle grade recently. As I have been doing this, I have come to a realization that there are two (probably more but for the purpose of this review I’ll say two) different types of middle grade/children’s books. 1) The kind where you can read it, have fun but don’t necessarily learn too much from it and 2) the kind that show you something, teach you something, or help you experience something important. This book is of the second type.

I believe that the reason I did not connect with this book as much as I thought that I would was because I have read other books in the past with this theme that really helped me grow. But, I think that for upper elementary and middle schoolers, this book could be really important. I really am a fan of books that help children learn something that we just kind of expect people to know. This book has themes of acceptance, empathy and friendship which are all things that I believe that students need to learn. In the end, I did enjoy this book. I can’t even really say that there is anything wrong with it. I really enjoyed it and I can’t wait to teach this book in my classrooms in the future.