In Mibs Beaumont's family, your 13th birthday is a big one; that is when you find out what your savvy, or special power, is. Mibs hopes hers isn't setting off storms like her brother Fish, but when the big day arrives her dad is in a hospital miles away from home, and Mibs' mother and older brother leave to be with him. When Mibs discovers her savvy, she realizes it can help save her dad's life. She sneaks on a pink bus heading to her dad's hospital in Salina, and before she -- or the driver -- knows it, she is heading away from Salina with Lester, the harried bus driver, her two brothers Fish and Samson, Bobbi and Will, the preacher's kids, and Lill, a down and out waitress. Their adventures on the way to Salina will change them all, but especially Mibs, who finds out that perhaps she had her savvy all along.This was a very fun book -- the idea of having a "savvy" was very creative, and it's hilarious to find out how each person in Mibs family deals with their own savvy. Of course, everyone has savvy -- some more magical than others.
I always enjoy kids books that are great writing and fun to read, but that also leave you thinking about things -- I hate to say that they have a "moral" but they do really get you to consider your own life -- and maybe make you feel just a bit better about being yourself. Savvy
is one of those books!2008, NY: Dial Books for Young Readers
is the story of an unlikely family -- a bloodhound named Ranger, a calico cat, and her two kittens, Sabine and Puck -- who live underneath the house of Ranger's owner, a social outcast who lives to hunt animals. When Puck, against his mother's warnings, adventures out from under the house, all of their lives change in ways they couldn't have imagined. Woven into their stories is the story of Grandmother Snake, her beloved daughter, Night Music, her husband Hawk Man, and their daughter. 
