How It Was Supposed to Be: I was supposed to play the piano. The piano is a beautiful instrument. Elegant. Dignified. People wear ball gowns and tuxedos to hear the piano. With the piano, you could play Carnegie Hall. . . . A piano is glamorous. Sophisticated. Worldly. It is a wonderful thing to play the piano.

How It Is: I play the organ. A wood-grained, vinyl seated, wheeze-bag organ. The Perfectone D-60.”

The Perfectone D-60 is, of course, an emblem of sorts for narrator Zoe Elias’s not-so-perfect life. Her mom’s always at work; her dad’s afraid to leave the house; her best friend has found another best friend; Wheeler Diggs keeps following her home; and Colton Shell, the guy she really likes, doesn’t even notice her. However, things get really complicated when Zoe agrees to enter the Perform-a-Rama playing Neil Diamond’s Forever in Blue Jeans on her Perfectone D-60. How will she get to the competition? Will her mom be able to get off work long enough to see her perform? Why did she want to be in a competition in the first place? And what if, heaven forbid, she makes a mistake?

Zoe’s parents are wonderful, imperfect parents. Zoe herself is just imperfect enough to be believable. She learns to play quickly and well, but she’s not a prodigy, just a dedicated musician who enjoys her music in spite of her imperfect instrument and her rather odd teacher, Miss Person. A Crooked Kind of Perfect has a great title and a narrator with an incomparable voice, just right for a ten year old with ambitions. It’s a funny book, yet it has a serious message about perfectionism and about living and thriving in the midst of imperfection.

One of Zoe’s dreams the night before the Perform-o-rama:

Dream #4
My mom is judging the Perform-O-Rama.
I’m wearing a tiara and playing “Forever in Blue Jeans.”
I am perfect.
I think I’m perfect.
I’m not perfect.
My mom shows me her judging sheet. It is filled with red marks—one for each wrong note.
And then a phone rings and everybody turns and looks and there in the audience Vladomir Horowitz is pulling a cell phone out of his tuxedo pocket.
‘Hello?’ he says. He looks at me.
‘It’s for you.'”

Three more dreams and a lot more humor, if you read the book.

Other bloggers review A Crooked Kind of Perfect:

Becky at Deliciously Clean Reads: “The characters, the relationships are about as perfect as can be. I’ve never seen family dynamics so well captured, so well displayed. Linda Urban has created memorable, authentic characters. The book has it all–moments of happiness, frustration, disappointment, loneliness, and joy. And plenty of humor!”

Shelf Elf: “Linda Urban deserves plenty of attention for her debut. I’ve been inspired. Next time I visit my mom’s place, you can bet I’ll be spending a little time grooving my way down memory lane with my old favs from Roger’s and Hammerstein Hits backed up by a little Boogie Woogie Bass.”

Jen Robinson’s Book Page: “This is an excellent book to give to a kids in the third to sixth grades. It’s a relatively easy read, but with a lot of hidden depth that I think the kids on the middle school end (and higher) will be more able to appreciate. For example, there is a painful scene in which Zoe attends a party where she brings the wrong gift and wears the wrong clothes. This will resonate with any reader who has ever had such an experience. (And who hasn’t?)”

All of the following books were nominated for the Cybil Award for Middle Grade Fiction. Links are to a Semicolon review of the book in question.

For the gifted child looking for special opportunities: The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart.

For the baseball fan: The Aurora County All-Stars by Deborah Wiles or Edward’s Eyes by Patricia Maclachan.

For the strong, silent type: No Talking by Andrew Clements.

For the spiritual seeker: Leap of Faith by Kimberley Brubaker Bradley.

For the entrepreneur: The Lemonade War by Jacqueline Davies.

For the wild would-be writer: The Wild Girls by Pat Murphy.

For the dog lover and the soldier: Cracker by Cynthia Kadohata.

For the prospective spy: Clarice Bean, Don’t Look Now by Lauren Child or The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart.

For the guide dog trainer: The Friskative Dog by Susan Straight.

For the horse-lover: Paint the Wind by Pam Munoz Ryan.

For the songwriter and the artist: Louisiana’s Song by Kerry Madden.

For the upwardly mobile shopper chick: The Secret Identity of Devon Delaney by Lauren Barnholdt.

For the girl scientist who aspires to popularity: Social Experiments of Dorie Dilts: Dumped by Popular Demand by PG Kain.

For the person with hidden talents: The Talented Clementine by Sara Pennypacker.

For the student of African-American history: Celeste’s Harlem Renaissance by Eleanora E. Tate or Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul Curtis.

For the logical and the singular (and for those who live with a logically left-brained person): Emma-Jean Lazarus Fell Out of a Tree by Lauren Tarshis.

For the internet addict: Dear Jo by Christina Kilbourne.

For the bear-lover: Bearwalker by Joseph Bruchac.

For the organist/pianist: A Crooked Kind of Perfect by Linda Urban.

For the ambitious adventurer: Isle of Swords by Thomas Wayne Batson or Leepike Ridge by Nathan D. Wilson.

For the chess strategist with or without anger issues: Chess Rumble by G. Neri.

For the immigrant: Home of the Brave by Katherine Applegate.

For the Korean-American adoptee: Kimchi and Calamari by Rose Kent.

For the girl who would be queen: The Broken Bike Boy and the Queen of 33rd Street by Sharon G. Flake.

For the communication specialist: Miss Spitfire by Sarah Miller.

For the potential desert survivor: Camel Rider by Prue Mason.

For the scrapbooking middle schooler: Middle School is Worse Than Meatloaf by Jennifer L. Holm.

For the puzzle-solver: The Puzzling World of Winston Breen by Eric Berlin.

For the gardener/poet: Reaching for Sun by Tracie Vaughn Zimmer.

For the grower of giant pumpkins (or any giant vegetable): Me and the Pumpkin Queen by Marlane Kennedy.

For the older sister with responsibilities: The Middle of Somewhere by J.B. Cheaney.

I discovered this gem of a book on the New Books shelf at the library and decided to take a chance. Then, lo and behold, it got nominated for the Cybil Award for Middle Grade Fiction, an award for which I just happen to be on the nominating committee. I don’t know if Leap of Faith will make the finalist list for the Cybil Award or not, but it is one of the best books for children about faith and Christianity and religion that I’ve read —ever.

You can probably name several children’s and young adult books that mention God and faith and Christianity. And, of course, if you’re a Christian kid there are several preaching-to-the-choir choices available at the Christian bookstore, fiction that attempts to convert or to encourage the already converted. But how many children’s books can you name that are actually about the process of coming to faith, without being preachy or proselytizing? There’s The Bronze Bow, Newbery Award winning historical fiction by Elizabeth Speare from fifty years ago. What else?

Leap of Faith is about Abigail, a sixth grade girl from a non-religious family who’s forced to attend a Catholic school. She’s “forced” because she’s been expeled from the local public school —for attacking a boy with a knife in the school cafeteria. It doesn’t help matters that the boy Abigail knifed was the son of the public school’s principal. Nor does Abigail’s anger dissipate easily when her parents refuse to discuss the reason that she used a knife and act as if they don’t really believe that she was defending herself. (The book is a bit like Laurie Halse Anderson’s Speak, although not quite as dark or as mature in theme.)

As the story progresses, Abigail decides to get her parents’ attention by doing something completely outrageous, becoming a Catholic. She doesn’t really believe any of that God stuff, but she’s not sure why her lack of faith should be an obstacle to her saying the words and doing what’s necessary to shock her parents into seeing her and listening to what she says. Abigail’s just tired of being invisible in her home.

She also becomes involved in drama class at her new school, and despite her intentions to remain invisible at school, she makes friends, especially one friend Chris, who’s really Catholic and good at drama and just easy to be around. As Abigail grows and learns to deal with her anger, she unexpected discovers that she has a gift for acting. And she discovers some other unexpected things about herself, too.

Again, this is a great book about a hard subject to get right. God, especially Christianity and God, is almost a taboo subject in children’s literature. It’s OK to mention prayer or going to church or questions about God and the Bible. But to write an entire book about a girl who pretends to become a Christian and then surprises herself by actually believing . . . well, that’s ground-breaking, as far as I’m concerned. And I commend Ms. Bradley for her guts and her excellent writing.

By the way, I’m not Catholic, but I am Christian. I think non-Catholics and non-Christians and Catholics and anyone with an open mind would enjoy reading Leap of Faith.

Other bloggers:

Miss Erin: “One of my favorite things about Cybils is the opportunity to read a book that I probably wouldn’t have picked up otherwise; particularly when I end up really liking it. Leap of Faith was one of those, and I’m happy I had the chance to discover it.”

I’m really not an animal person. I don’t much like animals, and I don’t really own any. (My kids have a cat that’s supposed to stay outside, but that’s another story.) I never went through the junior high love of horses phase nor the phase that all my friends went through when they wanted to go to Texas A&M and become veterinarians. I haven’t ever read a single Marguerite Henry book all the way through.

However, I really, really enjoyed Pam Munoz Ryan’s new book, Paint the Wind, billed as “a breathtaking horse story in the enduring tradition of Marguerite Henry.” The story is told mostly from the point of view of Maya, an orphan whose parents died in a car accident and who lives with her insanely over-protective paternal grandmother. When Maya’s grandmother dies, Maya goes to live with her mother’s family, a family that Grandmother has always warned Maya to avoid because they “live with animals. Like animals.”

But, of course, it’s time for Maya to make her own way and come to terms with her mother’s family, a family of ranchers in Wyoming, and decide for herself whether she’s suited for the freedom and wide open spaces of the West.

Aunt Vi leaned back on her elbows, and her eyes turned wistful, like when she sang around the campfire.
‘Look around. Out here in all this bigness, every single thing matters and stands out. When the horses run against the wind with their manes and tails flying, I think they look like fleeting brushstrokes of color. I consider them the artists on this enormous outdoor canvas, making it more beautiful.'”

That description reminded me of West Texas where I grew up. Maybe that’s a part of my fondness for this story, but it’s only a part. Ms. Ryan does do a fine job of describing and placing the reader in the “bigness” of Wyoming ranching country. Here’s another example:

Maya . . . slowly turned in a circle and looked up at an endless and cavernous sky. There was far more heaven above her than there was earth below, and the horizon seemed worlds away. Without a white wall to define her boundaries, how would she ever know when she disappeared from someone’s view?”

I like that thought because I’ve felt the opposite. When I first came to Houston, I felt trapped and enclosed by all the trees. Even in the town in West Texas, it’s fairly easy to find a place where you can see the horizon stretching out in a long line in front of you, but here there is no horizon, just more and more trees. Too many boundaries. I’ve become accustomed to it for the most part, but I still feel a wonderful sense of freedom and limitless possibility when I drive out to West Texas and see the horizon out in the distance.

Paint the Wind is a book about boundaries and about freedom, about wild horses and the dangers and the advantages of running free. Aunt Vi tells Maya not to let the sky “swallow you up.” But she also advises Maya that some horses, at least, are better off in the wild even though it’s perilous and the horses are exposed to predators and to the whims of men who sometimes capture the wild horses in what’s called a “gather.” Interspersed throughout the book are several short chapters that are told from the point of view of Artemesia, lead mare of a wild horse band whose fate becomes intertwined with Maya’s.

Maya travels from sterile safety to adventure and excitement as the story progresses, and she grows from a spoiled, over-protected girl into a confident young lady. I found the story, the setting, and the characters intriguing and beautifully realized.

Paint the Wind is one of the nominees for the Cybil Award for Middle Grade Fiction.

Other bloggers reviews:

Miss Yingling didn’t much care for Paint the Wind.

Camille at Book Moot, however, says “the book will have great appeal for those same horse loving book readers.”

Franki at A Year of Reading: “I always read for character–plot is secondary to me as a reader-and Maya will stay with me for a very, very long time.”

Bethy-Bee’s review:

Iva May has one last best friend, Elizabeth Evans who moves away (she didn’t even get to say good bye!). When Iva May goes to her first day of school Jenna still picks on her and —wait a minute, let me tell you about Jenna. Her name is Jenna Drews and she is bratty, bossy and other mean things. Anyway, Iva May comes in the bus, and mean old Jenna is there waiting for her. Jenna is the meanest girl ever. Anywhere. You get the picture. She gets on and Jenna picks on her and she sits down and wishes Elizabeth was there to comfort her, but she was not. Later, in recess she wishes Elizabeth was there to play with her, but she was not. Iva May needs a new friend, but not Jenna.

Sherry’s thoughts:

This book is another one about friendship, making friends, telling stories in order to impress a new friend. It reminded me of Tall Tales, another Cybil nominee, without the alcoholism and pitched to a little bit younger audience. Iva May is an engaging character, and the story feels believable and fun. The idea of having a secret friend with whom you exchange notes hidden in a secret hiding place is a great device. Kids love secret messages and secret languages and secrets in general. Does anyone remember The Secret Language by editor and author Ursula Nordstrom? It was one of my favorite stories many, many years ago. I should re-read and see if it’s held up to the passage of time.

My Last Best Friend is a cute school story about how to and how not to make friends. It may not last a hundred years, but it should be good to pass an afternoon for the younger set and inspire them to their own secret-message writing and receiving.

Other bloggers review My Last Best Friend:

KidsReads: “Without meaning to do so, Ida has slipped into another special friendship. Should Ida risk revealing her true identity?”

Laura Bowers: “Debut author Julie Bowe tells a charming story that will win the heart of any girl who’s faced her fear sideways.”

Little Willow interviews author Julie Bowe.