Melody Murray's Books

This book is so good on many levels. Unlike a lot of the MG stuff I've read in the last year or so, I think that this will actually appeal to the target audience. The characters are warm and believable and the sixth-grade narrator's voice is the most authentic I've come across in ... maybe ever. I bought it all, though I saw it all coming. Well, most of it.There's a mean girl, and though I mostly don't like books with mean girls, this one felt way more real. I keep coming back to that, the realness of this book. Also the food. And the girl-boy interactions. The only tiny bobble for me was the Chinese school- when we hear of it at first, it's a new venture, a start-up- but when Lucy gets there, it's an edifice, with multiple classrooms, lots of teachers, lots of bureaucracy. 4.5 stars.