Skip to main content

Here in the Real World



Here in the Real World 
By Sara Pennypacker
Balzer + Bray, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, 2020. 308 p.

Ware is a total introvert. He is excited to spend his summer vacation with his grandma in Florida where she won’t care if he spends long hours alone by the pool doing pretty much nothing. Only when his grandma has an accident and is taken by ambulance to the hospital, Ware is taken home and signed up for a Summer Rec program—which he hates. Instead of going into the community center Ware starts to head to the vacant lot next door after his mom drops him off. There he meets Jolene who is trying to garden and keep all her secrets. Ware loves knights and medieval chivalry, so he tries to transform the church building ruins on the lot into a castle. Meanwhile Ware learns from Jolene (and Ashley who comes and goes through the lot as well) what is fair, what is right, and what happens in the real world. Ware is a good boy with a heart in the right place. He is very shy and doesn’t totally understand how to interact with others, but he does have a heart of gold and tries his best to look for the good and right in the world around him. Readers will cheer Ware on as he tries his best to make the real world the best place it can be.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

If You Like...KPop Demon Hunters

KPop Demon Hunters has been one of the most talked-about movies of the summer. If you loved this movie as much as I did, you don't want the magic (or the music) to stop. Try reading these books that touch on some of the same topics and themes as the animated hit! Brick Dust and Bones By M. R. Fournet New York: Feiwel and Friends, 2023. Fiction. 247 pages. Orphaned Marius works in the family business--as their cemetery's ghost caretaker. However, Marius also moonlights as a monster hunter in order to earn the costly Mystic currency he needs to bring his mother back from the dead. As the window to bring his mother back begins to close, Marius's exploits get more and more dangerous, and he may have set his sights on a monster too big to handle on his own. Like Mira, Marius longs for familial connection, and his work as a monster hunter will satisfy the thrill of demon hunting for fans the movie. Where's Halmoni? By Julie J. Kim Seattle, WA: Little Bigfoot, 2017. Comics. W...

Review: Kareem Between

  Kareem Between By Shifa Saltagi Safadi New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2024. Fiction. 324 pages.  Kareem loves football and as he gets ready to start seventh grade he dreams of someday becoming the first Syrian American NFL player. Seventh grade is not off to a great start for Kareem, after football tryouts don't go as he had planned, his best friend moves away, and his mom returns to Syria to help bring his sick grandfather to the US for treatment. So when Austin, the quarterback and coach's son, offers to talk to his dad and get Kareem on the football team in the spring, if he will cheat and do his homework for him, Kareem agrees. Kareem really wants to fit in at school and he is desperate to find a friend, but deep down he knows that doing Austin's homework isn't the right thing to do. And to make things harder, Kareem's mom asks him to be a friend to Fadi, a Syrian Christian refugee. He knows he should stand up for Fadi and help him adjust to the new school,...

Winter 2026 Book Boxes

Looking for a new read? We’ve got you covered! Check out one of our Book Boxes for kids ages 9-12. Each Book Box contains a book to check out, as well as envelopes filled with fun surprises that you can open as you read along. We have two new books available to check out! Boxes can be put on hold through the library website, and can picked up at the Circulation Desk. Our One Dead Spy and The Case of the Missing Marquess Book Boxes will each be available to pick up from December 19, 2025 through December 30, 2026. Each child aged 9-12 can check out each Book Box once during that time, so get one now to read during winter break, or wait until summer and check it out then! One Dead Spy By Nathan Hale New York : Amulet Books, 2012. 127 pages. Comic. This graphic novel tells the tale of Nathan Hale, one of America's first spies, who was hanged for espionage in 1776. But in this version, just before he is set to be hanged he is eaten by a giant book, which he uses to explain the revoluti...