Clara Voyant

April 15, 2018
After her grandmother's move to Florida, future investigative reporter Clara Costa finds life with just her ditzy mother, Gaby, maddeningly unpredictable.Now Clara and Gaby live in Toronto's lively, diverse Kensington Market neighborhood in an apartment above Healing Herbs. There, Gaby diagnoses ills and dispenses unscientific remedies. Clara misses her grandmother's practical, predictable ways. On the bright side, Clara's bonded with classmate Maeve, a budding actress who's appreciative of Clara's colorful, chaotic home. Clara hopes to prove herself as a reporter for the school paper, but the knitting-club profile that Wesley, the ambitious grade-eight editor, assigns Clara offers little scope for her talents. Next, Wesley wants Clara to write a horoscope column: Clara Voyant. Meanwhile, the school mascot, Buzzter the Honeybee (an aging piñata), is stolen. This mystery's a perfect match for Clara's investigative talents, but skeptic Clara is stuck with astrological predictions. When these come true, she's perplexed and intrigued. She also hunts for Buzzter, knowing it'll be a terrific scoop if she can find him. Clara and the book's default are white, with the abundant diversity primarily indicated through naming convention; Maeve is biracial and Chinese-Canadian. The plot hums along briskly, but the humor wobbles. At its best--Wesley's a case in point--it's dry, succinct, and funny, but Gaby's more caricature than character. While the plot has amusing twists and turns, the author waffles on the existence of clairvoyance itself.A lightweight but enjoyable read. (Fiction. 8-12)

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May 1, 2018

Gr 4-7-Clara craves normalcy and organization. With her beloved grandmother deserting their home in Toronto for sunny Florida, Clara is left to the whimsical parenting of her mother, Gabby. Gabby "follows her bliss" and moves them to an apartment in a new neighborhood, paints the apartment walls in colors like Mango and Ripe Tomato, and gets a job at an herb shop mixing potions and remedies. Clara is mortified. Clara's life only gets worse when she is assigned to write horoscopes for the middle school paper under the pen name Clara Voyant. What self-respecting investigative journalist would stoop to such "woo-woo" malarkey? Embarrassingly, the horoscope column is a resounding success, with stunningly accurate predictions. Now, Clara is besieged by students wanting to know their futures, and she is given a permanent position at the paper. Clara decides to take charge of her destiny and sets out to prove her journalistic chops by finding the missing school mascot. This lighthearted mystery focuses more on character development than suspense. Clara is so driven to compensate for her mother and create an orderly world that she overlooks the potential for fun and friendship. As the plot develops, she struggles to accept that she may actually be clairvoyant, but eventually opens her heart to a bit of eccentricity. VERDICT Clara is an utterly likable character and readers will root for her. A solid purchase for larger collections, especially where readers enjoy a touch of the supernatural in their mysteries.-Nancy Nadig, Penn Manor School District, Lancaster, PA

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