Simon Sort of Says

It’s hard for me to ignore a book when it’s getting such Newbery buzz, even though I know that books that get all that buzz rarely go home with the gold. As a devoted reader of Heavy Medal, SLJ’s Mock Newbery blog, this book has been on my radar all year. Since the beginning, it’s been the most nominated Heavy Medal title, and so when it was time to pick a November middle grade book club, I decided to get two birds with one stone, take advantage of my library’s many copies, and cross this one off my TBR list.

Simon is a 12-year-old boy and the newest student in a weird town: one where no one has phones or computers or microwaves because of the scientific research being done around them. That’s just perfect for Simon though, because he and his family didn’t leave their last town over the alpaca incident, but rather the school shooting that Simon survived, and really really doesn’t want to talk about anymore. This book is humorous in great ways, self-referential, gut-wrenching, and has a guide-dog-in-training plot line that’s adorable. Simon’s backstory is on the flap, but it doesn’t unfold into the plot of the story until later on, allowing you to truly see the impact the reveal has on him. As he makes his friends–the weird ones who like to trick scientists into believing in aliens, we fall in love with this weird world, and then watch it shatter with Simon.

I can definitely see why this is getting Newbery hype–it’s got the emotional appeal, the strong world building, and the gut punch I expect from a Newbery winner anymore. That makes it seem, to be, even less likely that it wins! I can’t explain it, but when I see a book with this much hype, I have to wonder what ones we are overlooking that are actually blowing the committee away right now!