Reviews

Mayday by Karen Harrington

yapxinyi's review against another edition

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5.0

I teared while reading this.

The tone of the reading is what I can imagine a boy of that age speaking in, and it was heart-warming how much he cared about his mother and grew to care for his grandfather. The funniest part for me was "Ronly Bonly Darlton".

Sometimes, bad things happen for a good reason. This was what I felt while reading this book.

awesome514's review against another edition

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4.0

The plot is a little loose and slow moving, but this is a wonderful middle-reader novel that delves deeply into characters. I was surprised that the developmental focus centered around the male characters, since this was written by a woman. But, she did a lovely job with 13 year old Wayne and his grandfather. I would definitely recommend this to middle school students.

pussreboots's review against another edition

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3.0

http://pussreboots.com/blog/2017/comments_07/mayday.html

Pluses:
The NTSB bits were the most interesting.
The search for the flag was also interesting.
Having a medical reason for Wayne to lose his voice was good.
Wayne's facts are interesting but there are too many.

Minuses:
Grandpa is a dick
Dad is an abusive dick (the doofus thing is act)
True story — if I have to read that phrase one more time I will chuck this book out a window.

A better (and nonfiction) book about recovery from a plane crash is [b:Lost Cat: A True Story of Love, Desperation, and GPS Technology|15793584|Lost Cat A True Story of Love, Desperation, and GPS Technology|Caroline Paul|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1350952959s/15793584.jpg|21515558] by [a:Caroline Paul|191523|Caroline Paul|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1398102701p2/191523.jpg]

pforpedrox23's review against another edition

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5.0

I thought I had my Newbery prediction pretty set for this part of the year, but this book makes me rethink that! I'll update this review when I get my ducks in a row.

cameesreads's review

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4.0

Another winner by Karen Harrington. The main character, Wayne Kovok, we have met before in Courage for Beginners and I loved hearing about his life and the quirkiness of Harrington's characters (Tim Lemoot the Texas Boot was amazing).

A few problems I found this this otherwise perfect little book. Wayne and his mom are passengers on a plan that crashes, leaving Wayne with out a voice and 33 other passengers dead. There is only one mention of Wayne experiencing PTSD, and really the whole thing is treated like he and his mom were in a small fender bender and escaped with only scratches and bruises. Granted, Wayne has all kinds of other stuff going on in his 12 yr old life, but I feel like there probably would have been more repercussions to what happened. Then again, I am no expert on that kind of thing.

Also, Wayne's voice was perfect. He was truly a 12 yr old kid. However, every other page he says "true story" and it began to drive me absolutely insane. I know kids talk like this, and maybe I just get too into books, but I thought if I read the words "true story" one more time I was going to lose it. Props to authentic narration though.

tinkeringlibrarian's review

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5.0

This is an amazing book of love and loss, and it managed to do the job I wish The Inexplicable Logic of my Life had done. Sweet, charming, funny, and. It too sacchrine, even if the end is tied up a bit too neatly.

ejderwood's review

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2.0

Maybe simply because I had high expectations, but I was pretty disappointed in this book. There didn't seem to be one cohesive story line or character growth and I never really connected to the main character, who's name I have already forgotten.

lyshoicakes's review

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5.0

I'm so glad I picked this book up. I read the premise on the back cover and I was invested. I read the book and it was so much better than I imagined. I started reading this book when my uncle died. I went to the wake almost every single day. I brought this book so I had something to do while we stayed there. Maybe it was fate that I picked this particular book to read during that time. My uncle and I were never really close, and he's a quiet individual... but I considered him to be close family. This book really helped me deal with things I didn't really want to deal with. It helped me a lot.

I cried several times while reading this book. It was a lot for me to take at times. But it was really sweet and heartwarming. Very well written, too. It was also difficult to read sometimes. The plane crash chapter was written in a way that made me feel like I was in it. It was so uncomfortable in the best way. Reading Wayne struggle communicating with others when he lost the ability to speak due to his injuries was also really hard. I felt just as constricted and helpless as he did. And I think that is a testament of how great of a writer Karen Harrington is.

The characters all felt real and human and the story was really good, too. I also think it ended in such a satisfying way. Really good book. Highly recommend it.