Suzanne Crowley gives us a very realistic novel about a very unique girl. The Very Ordered Existence of Merilee Marvelous is about a young girl who has a very different outlook on life. Her condition is never named, but it is Asperger's Syndrome. Merilee is only comfortable if she can keep precisely to her schedule. She has every minute of every day planned out. If anything disrupts her V.O.E. she becomes very agitated. Some new people move to her little town of Jumbo, Texas and have a very profound effect on Merilee's life. The question is will this be more than she can handle, or will Merilee rise above it and realize she can be more than the 'freak' that everyone thinks she is. There are lots of characters whose lives are all interconnected in this novel, but from each of them Merilee is able to learn something to help her become a better person.
Faker By Gordon Korman New York: Scholastic Press, 2024. Fiction. 214 pages. 12-year-old Trey is used to starting over at a new school -- he has the routine perfectly memorized: make new friends, introduce his dad to the wealthy parents of his new friends, and "Houdini" themselves out of there before they get caught running their latest scam. Trey's dad is a master con artist, and Trey has just been promoted to full-partner. Their new scheme for the next big score brings them to the affluent suburb of Boxelder, TN where Trey's dad has cooked up a fake electric car company for investors to buy into. The only problem is that Trey is starting to grow tired of moving around and never putting down roots, especially after forming a fast friendship with Logan and developing a crush on Kaylee, a socially conscious girl in his class. As Trey longs for a normal life, is there any way he can convince his dad to get out of the family business? Gordon Korman is a perennial favorit...
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