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A review by bickie
Sunny Side Up by Jennifer L. Holm
3.0
10-year-old Sunny ("my mom likes hippies") flies by herself from PA to visit her grandfather, who lives in a 55+ community in Palm Beach, FL in 1976. As Sunny has to reset her expectations (no kids live there though she finally meets the son of the groundskeeper, dinner is at 5:00 or before, she tries to sleep on a pull-out sofa, Disneyland is super far away, Grandpa thinks big plans are going to the post office or grocery store), her thoughts return to various events in the past 6 months or so at home which eventually explain why she is there. Her older brother, Dale, drinks and smokes (perhaps he is smoking marijuana, though that is not completely explicit), and during an altercation with his parents at the 4th of July fire works, he hit his little sister Sunny.
The book is aimed at middle-grade readers, and though the messages of talking about issues rather than keeping them as "secrets" is relevant to older students as well (and everyone, really), I am not sure whether older middle schoolers or high schoolers would stick with it. Perhaps. I wondered who "Dale" was from the very beginning. Best for ages 8-11.
The book is aimed at middle-grade readers, and though the messages of talking about issues rather than keeping them as "secrets" is relevant to older students as well (and everyone, really), I am not sure whether older middle schoolers or high schoolers would stick with it. Perhaps. I wondered who "Dale" was from the very beginning. Best for ages 8-11.