Overall Grade: C
Random House, Wendy Lamb Books; 2008
Eleven, from Newbery Honor recipient Patricia Reilly Giff, was pretty disappointing. There isn’t much actually bad to say about it—our biggest specific complaint was that she had characters cry when this seemed a little over the top. The saddest thing about this book was that nothing—at all—stood out. The plot was mediocre and predictable, the tension seemed contrived, the characters weren’t vivid enough. For a book that on the surface seems to be all about relationships (Sam’s relationship with his grandfather, with the new girl at school, with his reading teacher, with his neighbors), the relationships were very vaguely recreated…and the problem is it didn’t turn out to be about anything else either.
Eleven wasn’t a bad read, wasn’t an unpleasant way to spend a few hours…but we probably won’t remember it by this time next week.
Literary Quality: B
Plot: C
Voice: C
Originality: C
Descriptive Ability: B
Humor: C
Illustrations: (none)
Believability of Characters: C
Believability of Situations: C
Overall Reading Enjoyment: C
Possibly objectionable topics*: Vague memories of child abuse.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment