What Not to Do If You Turn Invisible

July 1, 2018

Gr 5-8-Ethel Leatherheard is a 12-year-old girl going through the roller-coaster ride known as puberty. Having been cursed with severe acne for most of her life and having to endure unrelenting bullying from her peers, Ethel is desperate for any solution she can find to make her skin clear and her life easier. Like many people today, Ethel looks on the Internet to find quick and easy cures. On an impulse, she buys a mysterious tea that promises to make her acne problem go away in an instant. With the combination of the tea and the power of a tanning bed, Ethel is indeed cured of many of her problems; yet one additional issue crops up: she is now totally invisible. At first, being invisible is great. Ethel is able to do what she pleases without fear of reprisal and she enjoys her life. But the "miracle cure" becomes more permanent, and Ethel is no longer able to be visible. This sends her into a panic as she, along with some friendly faces, strives to cure her invisibility and get her life back to normal. Equal parts hilarious and touching, Welford's story will appeal to tweens who are in the process of watching their bodies change. Ethel is a relatable character for whom readers will cheer. VERDICT A humorous and engaging story of one young person's journey to self-acceptance.-Christopher Lassen, BookOps: The New York Public Library and Brooklyn Public Library

Copyright 2018 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 1, 2018
Ethel Leatherhead inadvertently turns herself invisible but discovers astonishing family secrets.At 12, narrator Ethel has a whopping case of acne. Attempting to self-treat, Ethel combines an internet-purchased herbal tea and an accidental tanning-bed overdose of UV rays. She finds that she becomes entirely invisible--at first for a few hours, and by a third time seemingly permanently. The tea, Dr. Chang His Skin So Clear, causes foul-smelling burping but eventually actually seems to have helped Ethel's skin. Ethel has lived with her grandmother since her mother's death, when Ethel was 3. A classmate recently transplanted from London to Ethel's northeast English town of Whitley Bay is, like Ethel, an outcast and becomes an ally. Heavyset and outgoing, Elliott (dubbed Smelliot by classmates) is bright and loyal to Ethel. It is he who thinks to ask the proprietor of the mostly white community's Chinese restaurant to translate the Dr. Chang label, a moment that does not mitigate the story's Orientalism. The plot requires not only Ethel's (unseen) nakedness, but Ethel's accidental--and horrified--sightings of other characters' bare bottoms. The result is very funny and age-appropriate. The recent appearance of a stranger reveals surprising facts about Ethel's mother. Welford's narrative includes nicely timed, empathic humor and an honest, clear voice for Ethel along with intriguing speculation about what chemical and biological changes invisibility might demand.Mostly funny and mostly convincing. (Fiction. 10-13)

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September 15, 2018
Grades 5-7 Raised by her grandmother, 12-year-old Ethel has tried just about everything to cure her acne, but a new treatment, involving a mail-order remedy and a malfunctioning tanning bed, proves stunningly effective. Her acne has disappeared, along with the rest of her body: she's completely invisible (temporarily). Unfortunately, Ethel can't resist the temptation to try it again, first to help her friend Elliott and then to retaliate when bullies threaten to post videos exposing her secret. But invisibility is risky. Unseen only when completely unclothed, Ethel never knows when she'll become visible again?an agonizing prospect for a self-conscious tween. Ethel and Elliott are both strong, quirky characters who sometimes seem older than their years. Woven into Ethel's droll, engaging first-person narrative is a subplot involving her mother, who died nine years earlier, and her father, who disappeared soon afterwards. Vividly described details of Ethel's experiences make invisibility seem more believable than the family secrets revealed near the novel's end. An entertaining chapter book from the author of Time Traveling with a Hamster (2016).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)