Millicent Min, Girl Genius

The funny and vulnerable Millicent Min springs fully to life through reader Keiko Agena's warm, sensitive reading. In a summer of change, girl genius Millicent hides the fact that she's in high school in order to pass as a regular 11-year-old. She's convinced this is the only way she'll ever have a real friend. At her mother's insistence, she's on a volleyball team, but her ineptness is humiliating. Her best buddy, eccentric Grandma Maddy, is leaving for England. Worst of all, Millicent suspects her mother has a terminal disease. This audiobook is delightful in every way--characters, language, wisdom, and humor. Narrator Agena fully inhabits the heroine, making it a pleasure to spend time with both of them. E.S. (c) AudioFile 2004, Portland, Maine

Starred review from January 12, 2004
Youthful actress Agena, perhaps best known for her role as Lane Kim on TV's Gilmore Girls
, is perfect as Millicent Min, a certified genius who still has plenty to learn in this humorous and touching novel. Millicent has always been an overachiever, and takes pride in the fact that she will be entering her senior year of high school when her contemporaries begin sixth grade. Though she's long been content to spend hours at the library or visiting with her grandmother, the summer before 12th grade provides Millicent's social life a real jolt. Millicent's mom has signed her up for a volleyball team, and Millicent will be tutoring a family friend her own age, Stanford Wong. But along the way, Millicent finds her first true friend in 11-year-old Emily. And best of all—at least initially—Emily doesn't know a thing about Millicent's intellectual gifts and thinks Millicent is swell all the same. Agena nails the assured tone of someone who has reached lofty goals and received heaps of praise. In addition, her interpretation of Millicent's attempts to be a little more hip or popular are laugh-out-loud funny (just as they are written in Yee's fine debut novel). A solid and enjoyable listening experience from start to finish. Ages 8-12. (Oct. 2003).