The Wednesday Wars

Gary D. Schmidt
Clarion Books 2007

Holling Hoodhood is sure his seventh-grade English teacher, Mrs. Baker, hates his guts.

And that was before he accidentally wrecked the cream puffs, and before he accidentally let loose her pet rats, and before he started spouting curses from his Shakespeare reading (that was on purpose).

Repairing his relationship with Mrs. Baker is important. Mrs. Baker's family owns a sporting goods store, and Holling's father is hoping to get the architectural contract for their new building. As The Son Who Is Going to Inherit Hoodhood and Associates, Holling had better shape up and do whatever it takes to get on Mrs. Baker's good side, even if it means playing a dorky fairy in the community production of "The Tempest."

Set over forty years ago against the backdrop of the Vietnam War and the Civil Rights Movement, The Wednesday Wars is the hilarious story of a boy trying to navigate the rocky shoals of seventh grade. Holling's voice has an air of tall-tale telling that kept me laughing. But the book isn't all comedy. Holling's evolving relationships with the people around him reveal some poignant insights on friendship, on racism, and on what it means to be a hero.

One of the best books I've read in a long time. I recommend The Wednesday Wars for ages eleven and up.

Greetings From Planet Earth

Barbara Kerley
Scholastic Press 2007

I first met Greetings From Planet Earth by Barbara Kerley a couple of weeks ago at the library. The spine really caught my attention. That font, those colors - the book looked like it ought to be thirty or forty years old. But the book had a shiny new plastic jacket and a "NEW BOOK" sticker half-covering the first letter of the author's name. I had to investigate.

The cover illustration looked just like the cover illustrations on the books that had been published when I was very young - scratchy line drawing filled in with pools of uniform colors like bright red and pale turquoise. The end paper was that bumpy stuff you never see anymore. Published in 2007 but set thirty years ago, I held in my hands a piece of historical fiction about WHEN I WAS ALIVE ALREADY! I must be getting really old.

I smiled at the book designer's cleverness and popped it back on the shelf.

But I couldn't get it out of my head. Two weeks later I was back to check it out. I am glad I did. This is unlike any book I have read before. It deftly combined the wonder of moon exploration and the Voyager probes with the tragedy of Vietnam, all through the eyes of a twelve-year-old boy who wants to know more about his missing father. The book made me think, made me laugh, made me cry, made me wonder. What more could I ask?