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jina's review
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
5.0
The beautiful way science, art, and emotions experienced with loss in varying forms comes together is strong. Cleary shown in a variety of characters, both the children and adults.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death of parent and Grief
Minor: Bullying
yuna's review against another edition
emotional
funny
lighthearted
sad
medium-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
A lovely, tender story. It really captured the feeling of being a kid with all their enthusiasm and passion and feelings. And the way grief is conveyed in this book is so wonderful and so sad. Break my heart. Especially with how it compares and contrasts with how the adults and dealing with their grief, especially Mr. Voltz. He's a great side character and the awkwardness/kinda-afraid-of-you-kinda-not feel that the kids have around him at first is so spot on.
I found Benji's lack of questioning/asking "why" over his dad's leaving a bit suspect. His mom shuts down/refuses to engage in any talk about him, so ok, I can accept that (and I'm so glad we see her acknowledge that shortcoming later), but that Benji never talked to his brother about it?
Wish Drew's bullying had been called it such more than it was instead of as "pranks," since it went beyond that in pretty much every instance we saw. Not really buying into the resolution there either, especially since it didn't work time-wise between the Benji-Drew confrontation and the cleaning up of Ro's locker. I was under the impression that was done by someone else?
I found Benji's lack of questioning/asking "why" over his dad's leaving a bit suspect. His mom shuts down/refuses to engage in any talk about him, so ok, I can accept that (and I'm so glad we see her acknowledge that shortcoming later), but that Benji never talked to his brother about it?
Wish Drew's bullying had been called it such more than it was instead of as "pranks," since it went beyond that in pretty much every instance we saw. Not really buying into the resolution there either, especially since it didn't work time-wise between the Benji-Drew confrontation and the cleaning up of Ro's locker. I was under the impression that was done by someone else?
Content Warnings
Moderate: Bullying, Death of parent, and Grief
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