Today’s pick: Better
Than Weird by Anna Kerz
Orca, 2011
From
the Publisher:
Sometimes reading faces is a lot
harder than reading books.
In this stand-alone sequel to The
Mealworm Diaries, Aaron is anxiously waiting for his father to return for
the first time since Aaron's mother's death eight years earlier. Aaron works
hard with a counselor at school, but he still has problems getting along with
and understanding other kids, and he's worried that his dad will think he's
weird. As well as having to confront Tufan, the class bully, Aaron must find
ways to cope with the fact that his dad now has a pregnant wife and his beloved
Gran needs surgery. In the end, his greatest strength is not his intelligence
or his sense of humor, but the openness and warmth of his heart.
My Take:
It isn’t specifically stated in
the story, but from the clues about Aaron’s thoughts and behaviour, he seems to
have some kind of Autism Spectrum Disorder. The author presents a realistic
picture of how Aaron tries to cope and understand bullying, friendship and
family relationships. I read this book straight through without stopping,
because the writing is smooth and easy to read and the story was compelling. The
author’s portrayal of Aaron’s feelings and thoughts clearly showed his
different perspective on the story events as well as his personality.
Other Info:
Anna Kerz is a storyteller from Toronto.
This book has been nominated for the 2012
SYRCA Diamond Willow Award and has been distinguished as one of the Ontario Library Association’s Best Bets
for 201, named as a Canadian Children’s Book Centre Best Book and as a Notable
Book for the Global Society Book Awards 2012.
This book is nominated for the
Ontario Library Association’s Forest of Reading in the Silver Birch (Fiction)
category for 2012. I’ve profiled the
other nominated books: The
McGillicuddy Book of Personal Records, Crossing
to Freedom, Ghosts of the Titantic, Neil Flambe and the Aztec Abduction, That Boy Red, The Glory Wind, Ghost Messages, Milo: Sticky Notes and Brain Freeze and Undergrounders.
Other books by this
author include:
The Mealworm Diaries The Gnome’s Eye
For more, check out Anna Kerz’s website.
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Sounds good. And I love the title. Thanks for sharing this.
ReplyDeleteI love books that help readers get in the head of hard situations and/or disabilities. It spreads our world wider.
ReplyDeleteI love getting all this exposure to different MG writers and books. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteI am so looking forward to reading this one. Loved. loved THE MEALWORM DIARIES!
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