by Kathryn Fitzmaurice
ages: 10+
First sentence: “We lived in a perfect stucco house, just off the sparkly Pacific, with a lime tree in the backyard and pink and yellow roses gone wild around a picket fence.”

I started wondering if I went back and looked through my posts, how many would start like this:

[Blank — this time it was Becky and Natasha] highly recommended this/loved it, and I thought it sounded good/interesting/intriguing/worth my time, and so when it showed up at the library/I found it/pulled it off my pile, I found that I really liked/loved/thought it was good, too.

And then I go on to summarize the book [essentially: a girl, Eleanor “Groovy” Robinson, whose father ends up in jail the summer she turns eleven, learns to forgive] and say what I thought about the book [very sweet, very cute, and I loved the asides, how all the expressions were given “verbalizations”, her friendships, and Groovy’s journey through sadness, anger and finally acceptance of her father again, as well as all the food — the strawberries, the tacos espeically — and the recipe at the back!]

And then I hope you read it, like it, and are interested in the book.

When, really, what I’d like to do sometimes, is this: Becky loved it. Natasha loved it. Take their words for what they’re worth: it’s a great book.