Friday, July 15, 2022

Fact Friday: The Boy Who Failed Dodgeball by Jordan Sonnenblick

The Boy Who Failed Dodgeball by Jordan Sonnenblick. 246 p. Scholastic Press/ Scholastic Inc., June, 2022. 9781338749601. (Review of finished copy borrowed from public library.)

Fact Friday features The Boy Who Failed Dodgeball by Jordan Sonnenblick. Young Jordan Sonnenblick is entering middle school on Staten Island. He's attending I.S. 61, which is an arts magnet school, and he's pumped to be placed in morning band class. It's the class that performs and those students get to wear the red blazers. He's not pumped about acing all the math tests for a city-wide math competition and he refuses to join math club. Oh! And he gets off on the wrong foot with his L.A. teacher and is sent to the vice-principal's office on the first day of school!

Middle grade readers are treated to the highs and lows of Jordan's sixth grade year. Even though it takes place in the 1980s and modern tweens might not know who Evel Knievel was, they will relate to the anxiety of making new friends (and enemies), keeping old friends, having crushes and going on dates.

Amusing spot art is sprinkled throughout this episodic memoir, which is often laugh-out-loud funny. Fans of the author's books will enjoy reading this and super-fans may recognize a name or two. It sure was fun revisiting young Jordan. I hope there will be more from the boy who failed.

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