- 13-year-old finds himself raising raccoons with an unlikely partner
- readers will learn much about animal science without it feeling didactic
- convo: divorce, a weak father figure, accidental death, surrogacy, abortion, Down syndrome
- language: shoot x1, shut up x1, Good L*rd x2, stupid x1, gee x1, darn x1, crap x3, some mild name calling
Type: historical fiction chapter book
Ages: 11-15
Author: Betty Vanderwielen
Flash back to the 1980s! The age of the station wagons, bottom drawstrings on jackets, Blockbuster and house phones. For those of you around my age or a little older, isn’t it bizarre how our childhood is already “historical”? Ha!
As you can see from the bullet points above, this book has quite a few conversation points. My least favorite component was the immaturity of the dad. He never improved. As Christians, this brings us to discuss the God-given roles of fathers and what their actions and responsibilities should look like. Lance’s dad is a counter-example.
Lance, on the other hand, matures in the book, learning some life lessons and practical skills. Yet, for a good portion of the story, he has a serious issue of disrespect, complete with grumbles, talk back, and even hanging up on his mother multiple times. Much of his attitude is obviously inherited from his dad as he repeats to others rotten things his dad has said. Fortunately, later in the book, another man enters the scene and puts Lance and his best friend to work. Chapter 51 proves that boys and men need hard work to do. The boys become happier than they’ve been for a long time!
Divorce is so destructive. The book was totally “real life” and understandable as, I’m sure, most of us have experienced divorce in multiple ways. It affects generations and often, as in this case, communicates to kids to “leave the room” whenever there’s any conflict. Lance, having this as his life example, writes a three-page divorce letter to his mom.
The strangest part of the book was the secondary theme encompassing his mother having a surrogate pregnancy. It was a really odd topic for a middle grade book, but of course provides fodder for [a potentially heated] conversation. I’ll let parents dig into the theology on that one.
I want to mention one more thing for parents to be aware of. The older lady he works with to care for the raccoons takes him camping on a small island. They travel by canoe and sleep in the same tent, but it’s all business. They take the raccoon work seriously.
On the positive side, all the days Lance spends rehabilitating the kits are mighty interesting. Animal lovers will definitely enjoy those parts! Other potential attractors are multiple Star Wars references and kids saying “cool beans” a lot. 🙂 The book also gives a realistic view into what grief can look like for some people. I thought it was done tactfully.
Overall, my personal rating for this book was three out of five stars. Your child might rate it higher, though! Hope this helps. 🙂