Monday, November 21, 2011

December's Pick




In this funny, uncannily wise portrait of the dynamics of a sixth-grade class and of the greatness that sometimes comes in unlikely packages, Dwight, a loser,talks to his classmates via an origami finger puppet of Yoda. If that weren’t strange enough, the puppet is uncannily wise and prescient. Origami Yoda predicts the date of a pop quiz, guesses who stole the classroom Shakespearebust, and saves a classmate from popularity-crushing embarrassment with some well-timed advice. Dwight’s classmate Tommy wonders how Yoda can be so smart when Dwight himself is so clueless. With contributions from his puzzled classmates, he assembles the case file that forms this novel.

3 comments:

Anne said...

This was a VERY fast read. The author certainly captured the world of 6th graders perfectly. Those are some tough years, trying to figure out where you fit in the school hierarchy. The school dance scenes brought back some good? memories. Boys on one side, girls on the other. But we did NOT want to fast dance, only slow dance, cause you just draped your arms over each others shoulders and shuffled around. It wasn't graceful, but it worked. Kids can be so cruel to each other, the origami Yoda was a good deflector, just blame it on Yoda.

Lauri said...

It is nice to read a book that not only takes no time to read but also involves no actual thinking. After I finished reading it I wanted to see if I could "snap pencils one-handed." My nephew just finished reading this one and bought the second one, so it seems to be reaching it's target audience. I am glad Dwight got the girl in the end.

Anonymous said...

Cute story. I really disliked Junior High so reading this I wanted the kids to be nice to each other, but it is not a perfect world so we always have those stinky kids who make fun of everyone. I'm glad most of the kids turned it around and accepted Dwight for who he is. Nathan is so excited to read this he is about to burst so I guess I need to pass it on to him now. ;)