Going into this book I only knew two things about it: it won a Newbery and it contained the word scrotum... yeah, moving along. Not gonna lie about that second bit - I have no idea why Susan Patron thought this was necessary because it has absolutely no bearing on the plot whatsoever. But, as the old saying goes, this is your train - rob it.
Except she was robbing it for literature and not science.
I really enjoyed the book for the most part. It examines family in a different and interesting way - Lucky is being raised by her father's first ex-wife, a French woman named Brigitte. Her father has no role in either the book or her life and her mother is mentioned only to recount her death, funeral, and Lucky's inability to part with her ashes. I think that Lucky and Brigitte share an incredible dynamic - both loving each other but Lucky showing a believable amount of trepidation.
We are also given a glimpse of life in a tiny, tiny town. Everyone knows each other. For the most part they support each other. Some things simply don't exist in town and some really crazy things do. Living in a small town the last several years (not as small as in the book), I can relate to a lot of these things.
The important theme of family and how it isn't just the textbook definition are carried through to all the primary characters of the novel and the predictable (kind of sappy) ending is just the one you want.
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