The kids (and staff) treat Ellie like some kind of weird freak one moment, then ignore her the next. Ellie figures he's probably on the spectrum. Bert, who lives along with his dad and is a bit (ok a lot) weird. To her surprise, she makes friends - Coralee, whose mother has left her with an elderly relative and who dreams of getting out by winning talent contests. Life in the trailer park is better and worse than Ellie expects. Ellie and her mom decide to extend their Christmas vacation and stay with their grandparents until things calm down a little. Meanwhile, Ellie's grandfather's dementia is getting worse and her grandmother is not able to cope with him. and has finally been seizure-free long enough to go off her medication. Ellie's gotten her long-awaited appointment with the dr. Luckily for Ellie, her mom has other things to think about.
But kids in wheelchairs who have CP (Cerebral Palsy) are a "health risk" and are absolutely NOT supposed to skip. The thing is, she just needed a break and zipped out during lunch at school. She's eating freezer food while watching a baking show and hoping her aide doesn't call her mom. The story opens with a typical day for Ellie. So it wasn't a draw for me that Palacio had blurbed this book - is every book with a disabled character going to have to have the mark of approval of an abled person? Ahem. It all feels like one challenge too many, until Ellie starts to make her first-ever friends.I will just say straight out that I am not a fan of Wonder, although I know it's extremely beloved and we own a ridiculous number of copies. Except she’s not just the new kid-she’s the new kid in the wheelchair who lives in the trailer park on the wrong side of town. If she’s not writing fan letters to her favorite celebrity chefs, she’s practicing recipes on her well-meaning, if overworked, mother.īut when Ellie and her mom move so they can help take care of her ailing grandpa, Ellie has to start all over again in a new town at a new school. The thing is, Ellie has big dreams: She might be eating Stouffer’s for dinner, but one day she’s going to be a professional baker. That surprises some people, who see a kid in a wheelchair and think she’s going to be all sunshine and cuddles. In the tradition of Wonder and Out of My Mind, this big-hearted middle grade debut tells the story of an irrepressible girl with cerebral palsy whose life takes an unexpected turn when she moves to a new town.Įllie’s a girl who tells it like it is. “An honest, emotionally rich take on disability, family, and growing up.” - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“A big-hearted story that’s as sweet as it is awesome.” -R.J.
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