Isabella (Izzy) is part of a blended family. Well what does that mean? That means that Isabella has a white mom and a black father. Isabella is a brilliant student but struggles in school with racism and bullying. But this is only the start of what she calls her horrible life. Every night for the past week after Izzy's piano lessons, she has been hearing her parents fighting. Of course, Izzy didn’t expect anything, she never thought her father would be sitting on the bed saying a divorce is the best for us. This tore Izzy apart. How am ever going to get through life, she thought. As Izzy kept figuring out life and sort of adjusting to switching every week between her parent's houses all she could think about was her piano concert. One day when Isabella got to her dad's house there was a woman (Anastasia) standing there with a boy (Darren) who looked 17. Izzy was so confused and asked her dad what was going on. This is the part that really hit hard on Izzy. She didn’t think her dad was going to move on so quickly. After that day Izzy had thrown hate to her dad’s girlfriend and her son till one day her dad’s girlfriend got her a piano for her dad’s house. Izzy was so happy and didn’t know what to say. Her concert was in 2 weeks and now she could practice double! As days went by inching up to her big day, she had told her dad that Darren - her future to be stepbrother - would drive her to her concert. As they were driving to their concert, they wanted to stop for ice cream. As Darren and Izzy got out of the car, there were 2 robbers coming out of the ice cream shop and 2 cops chasing him. They couldn’t believe what just happened.......
I think this was an extraordinary book that really made me rethink things in ways I never thought I would. It made me take a step back rather than forward. I really liked this book because it gets to show a point of view on someone who doesn't live their life spoiled nor happy at some points. It also made me have mixed feelings for the characters in this book and people in real life. I recommend this book to 5th and 6th graders because of comprehending the theme and the meaning could be difficult for maybe a 4th grader. Although it says that this book is meant for 4th graders, I only think they were talking about the length. All in all, I think this book is amazing and has tons of meaning and awesome lessons that should be told to the whole world.
Reviewed by Isabella W., Grade 7
