28. Every Soul a Star - Wendy Mass

For: Middle Grades & Middle School
Published: Oct. 2008
322 pages
Rating: 5

This is the second Wendy Mass book I've read and I've become a fan. She knows how to tell a good story. This one, told in three voices, is wonderful.

Ally's parents moved to the middle of nowhere when she was small. They run an unusual campground, the Moon Shadow. They chose this spot because it's the perfect place to see a total eclipse of the sun, and they've been preparing for it for years. Ally has been homeschooled, loves where she lives, and is an expert on the skies: comets, asteroids, stars, you name it. However, she knows very little about the world outside her domain.

Bree is a self-centered A-clique pretty girl who just happens to be the daughter of two scientific-geek parents. She has her summer...and her life...all planned out when her parents drop the bomb-shell that they are going to take over the Moon Shadow Campground, in the middle of nowhere, for three years. Bree and her younger sister will be homeschooled there.

Jack is a self-proclaimed loser. Pudgy, clumsy, and lacking any self-confidence at all, he has failed science and must attend summer school. When his science teacher propositions him to attend a two-week Eclipse tour to the Moon Shadow Campground as his assistant, he goes, but with great trepidation.

The three, of course, meet. They bond, along with two younger 10 year-old siblings and another male "camper" named Ryan, share astronomy adventures, and change, all for the better, of course. And readers learn a lot about astronomy along the way. It's a feel good book. I'm not sure how realistic it is, but I do feel that relationships like the ones formed in the book DO happen. There's even a wise old lady that always wears sweatsuts to get attached to. Lots going on. I did, indeed, enjoy reading this tale.

FIRST LINE: "In Iceland, fairies live inside of rocks. Seriously. They have houses in there and schools and amusement parks and everything."

I've done a little research on Wendy Mass. I like both 11 Birthdays and Every Soul a StarI'm going to read more of her this summer.