by Rebecca Stead
ages: 10+
First sentence: “So Mom got the postcard today.”
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I knew — knew — that I had to read this book back in April, when Betsy wrote about it. (Go take a moment to go read it, if you already haven’t. It’s one of the ones that leaves me in awe of Betsy’s writing ability. Then come back, and be kind to my review.)

It has the feel of those books about precocious kids in the 1970s, books that I loved growing up: The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankenweiler, The Westing Game, Harriet the Spy, and — most of all — Wrinkle in Time. The last one, in fact, plays a major role in the novel: our main character, Miranda (named for the Miranda Rights) adores Madeline L’Engle’s classic, preferring to carry around and read her beat-up copy rather than the books with the spunky girls on the cover that her teachers put in front of her.

There is so much to love about this book. From the tight writing — as Betsy pointed out: Stead is not only amazing at capturing characters with minimal descriptions, but also at foreshadowing — to the plot itself, there is not a wrong moment in the book. For me, the best part of the whole book is puzzling out the mystery along with Miranda. It’s not a completely implausible puzzle, once one gets over the initial conceit, and it’s fascinating to see how all the pieces fall into place.

Fascinating doesn’t cut it: it’s a remarkable book all around.