3. Counting by 7s - Holly Goldberg Sloan

2013 Dial Books for Young Readers

380 pgs.

Tweens CRF

Finished 1/10/15

Goodreads rating: 4.15

My rating:    (5) Awesome  (I wanted more!)
TPPL

Contemporary Bakersfield, CA

1st sentence/s:  "We sit together outside the Fosters Freeze at a sea-green metal picnic table.  All four of us.  We east soft ice cream, which has been plunged into a vat of liquid chocolate (that then hardens into a crispy shell)."

My comments:  'kay....I loved this story.  It was brilliant.  Willow, the 12-year-old genius and her collection of people that ultimately made up her family - priceless! I want to read on and on and on, want more, more, more.  A definite feel-good book for older kids AND adults!

Becky's review from Becky's Book Reviews

Goodreads book summary:  In the tradition of Out of My Mind, Wonder, and Mockingbird, this is an intensely moving middle grade novel about being an outsider, coping with loss, and discovering the true meaning of family. 
     Willow Chance is a twelve-year-old genius, obsessed with nature and diagnosing medical conditions, who finds it comforting to count by 7s. It has never been easy for her to connect with anyone other than her adoptive parents, but that hasn’t kept her from leading a quietly happy life... until now.
     Suddenly Willow’s world is tragically changed when her parents both die in a car crash, leaving her alone in a baffling world. The triumph of this book is that it is not a tragedy. This extraordinarily odd, but extraordinarily endearing, girl manages to push through her grief. Her journey to find a fascinatingly diverse and fully believable surrogate family is a joy and a revelation to read.