Somebody's Girl

March 15, 2011

In a companion to Chance and the Butterfly (2011), released simultaneously, ultra-whiny fourth-grader Martha is teamed with foster child Chance to work on an extended school project. Martha has lots of issues: She's adopted, a fact she was okay with until her adoptive mother got pregnant; her birth mother is trying to establish a better relationship with her, although Martha definitely doesn't love the woman; she's alienated all of her friends with her prickly attitude; and her adoptive parents must not love her any more since they keep expecting her to help out a bit. Martha sometimes manages to put a good face on her dejection and anger, so the adults around her seem oblivious to her nearly poisonous attitude, but her peers are quick to discover her angst. With the exception of the occasionally tolerant Chance, a boy with a few adjustment issues of his own, she has become a pariah. While children are rarely angels, making Martha's baditude believable enough, she is a hard character to spend time with. Many readers relatively new to longer books may be unwilling to plow through 15 chapters focused on a girl they would most likely have little patience with if they knew her and so may miss the hidden message of looking beneath the surface at kids that present friendship challenges. (Fiction. 8-11)

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July 1, 2011

Gr 3-6-Martha is an exasperating yet sympathetic nine-year-old whose life is thrown into a tailspin when her adoptive parents announce that they are having a baby. She is bereft, furious, and maddeningly self-centered. She misses her perfectly groomed mother, who doled out homemade afterschool snacks and always chaperoned her dinners with her birth mother. Martha shrinks from Linda's smoky breath and her desperate hugs, but is hurt when she announces that she is getting married, moving away, and anticipates bringing up a baby with her fiance. She has alienated her friends, and is scornful of Chance, a foster boy. She suspects that their teacher put them on a project together because they don't live with their birth parents. Being adopted and being a mere foster child are vastly different in her view, and she is impatient that her teacher does not understand that. Martha is enthralled by the natural world, though, and fish, and Chance shares her obsession, so their joint project earns rave reviews. De Vries does not play down how prickly Martha is, yet when the child acknowledges her selfish behavior and welcomes the new baby, she demonstrates that maturing is hard work. The story is beautifully written, and Martha and Chance are particularly authentic and robust, though even minor characters are deftly drawn. Although the book has a strong appeal to those interested in fiction about open adoptions, it deserves a wide audience because it is so well told.-Deborah Vose, East Middle School and South Middle School, Braintree, MA

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