These stories for young readers explore friendships, frustrations
Spring is on its way, and with it the promise of new beginnings. The best of all beginnings is a new friendship — or a reborn one — and two middle-grade novels about the power of friendship are the perfect way to celebrate the season.
In “The Right Hook of Devin Velma,” Jake Burt paints a genuine and funny picture of sixth-grade friends turned enemies, starting with a punch and then stepping back to why it was thrown (ages 10 to 14, Feiwel and Friends, $16.99). Burt’s ode to guy friendship has minor fisticuffs — and some truly touching moments for longtime buddies Devin and Addison, who eventually find they are an even better team than they’d realized.
There’s plenty of foolishness (including the “Double-Barreled Monkey Bar Backflip of Doom”), but also a refreshing dose of real-life problems. These L.A. kids might have a wild plan to solve their woes — finding fame and fortune as socialmedia darlings — but they find that one old-fashioned friendship is worth more than a thousand followers.
Barbara O’Connor’s “Wonderland” is set in a much smaller town — Landry, Ala. — but shares the same joyful approach to friendships of all sorts, old, new, human and canine (ages 8 to 12, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $16.99). When Mavis moves to town, she is determined that she will finally have a best friend — and Rose is it, whether she’s ready or not. Along the way, Mavis learns how to be “the best best friend that anyone could have,” and the girls both figure out how much patience and persistence best friendship really takes. The heart-warming tale finds the two girls struggling to match up another pair of potential best friends — a runaway greyhound and an aging security guard — and, along the way, bringing out the best in each other. Caroline Luzzatto, luzzatto. bookworms@gmail.com