Down in the Belly of the Whale
YA
Aionios Books, LLC
May 5th 2018
EBook
235
A contemporary story about family and friendship for fans of Eleanor Porter and L.M. Montgomery.
Harper Southwood is a teenage girl who can sense when people will get sick—but so what? She can’t predict her best friend’s depression or her mother’s impending health crisis. Being helpful is all Harper ever wanted, but she feels helpless in the face of real adversity. Now, she’s got a chance to summon her courage and use her wits to fight for justice. Laugh and cry along with this irrepressible, high-spirited teen in her journey of self-discovery, as she learns that compassion and internal strength are her real gifts, her true superpower.
WrensReads Review:
Thank you to the publisher for a review copy of this book. All the words below are my own opinions and thoughts
This was a very interesting read. There are a lot of issues thrown into this little book. I am going to keep my review short
Harper and Cora both are dealing with separate things and have a lot of growth through the book. Sexual Assault and Illness are the big contenders. I do feel as if this book had a lot of things thrown into it, so not all the pieces could be discussed and digested at length. This story had a lot of promise to dig deep into one of the biggest problems we are facing today, and I feel it only touched the surface.
It is still an enjoyable and something I believe a lot of people will enjoy. The narrator of the story writes the way people talk. For example, when someone stretches a word out like “waaaaay” or they mispronounce something, the author writes it the way it sounded. I really enjoyed though, even though it does make it seem like a younger read than the topics it talks about.
Over all, I think this is a book young kids should read in order to be able to see the signs people are giving off around them. There are more people than you think that are dealing with a lot of the issues in this book, including someone close to you I bet.
Sometimes people don’t know how to ask for help; sometimes they just need someone to see and care.
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