Recently, I have finished reading Wonder, it is a 315 paged fantasy book by an american author named Raquel J. Palacio, she mainly writes books about realistic fiction. She is a graphic designer and author . live in NYC with my husband, two sons, and two dogs. For many years, she was a art director and book jacket designer, designing covers for countless well-known and not so well-known writers in every genre of fiction and nonfiction. She always wanted to write, though. She kept waiting for the perfect time in her life to start writing, but after more than twenty years of designing book jackets for other people, she realized that the perfect time would never really present itself. It’s never the perfect time to start writing a book. So she decided to just go for it. Wonder is her first novel. This book more or less relates to young teenagers that get bullied because a lot of kids get bullied in middle school. Also many of the characters are teenagers including the main character.
The book isn’t difficult but as you keep reading the books they become thicker. The book is very exhilarating and is always leaving you with cliffhangers leaving the reader wanting to read more until the book is over. If you like realistic fiction books this series is the series for you because after reading 4 of the books it never ceases to excite me and never disappoints.
August Pullman has been homeschooled due all his life because of a facial abnormality and the many amounts of surgeries that comes with it. When August finally turns ten, his parents are beginning to think about send him into a public school because he can’t hide all his life in fear. At Beecher Prep in Manhattan, fifth grade is the first year of middle school. At first Auggie hates the idea of so many kids staring at his face. But when his mom tells him about the little chicks at school he gets very excited. Mr. Tushman, the principal of Beecher Prep arranges a small group of people in introduce August to the new school. Mr. Tushman asks three kids he believes are going to give Auggie a warm welcome so he chooses them to, show him around, and help him transition into school life. Auggie on the first day of school finds himself sitting alone at lunch. A extremely nice girl named Summer sits down and tries to talk to him. She at first sits with him because she feels bad for him, but eventually them become friends. Jack’s desk is next to Auggie’s in almost every class. And once he gets used to Auggie’s face, Jack realizes that Auggie is a cool, smart, fun kid, plus a really good friend. But Jack isn’t a very good friend and he finds himself talking behind Auggie’s back. He doesn’t realize that Auggie is sitting next to him, wearing a Halloween mask. Auggie is devastated and filled with betrayal, he eventually ends up bolting for the bathroom in tears. Via, his big sister motivates him into returning, saying that learning to cope with the hardships. Auggie goes back to school, but evidently drops Jack for stabbing him in the back. Jack and August finally make up and it seems like life is getting back on track… at least until Jack returns from break and finds himself suddenly being isolated as well. Julian has convinced the entire class to go against Jack for his decision to remain friends with Auggie. Jack’s and Auggie’s friendship is truly put to the test now, as he suffers with Auggie being rejected from everyone. Now If he decides to leave Auggie, he gets to hang with the popular kids but Auggie and Summer are pretty much the only kids that still talk to him. He still remains true to his word and stays with Auggie. Auggie and Jack are surrounded in the woods one night by some big seventh-graders looking for trouble, and Auggie is verbally and physically abused for the way he looks. Auggie’s expensive hearing aids are lost in the night. Even in pain and in tears, he realizes that boys who have either let him feel like an outcast or given him no attention him have, finally, stood up for him and helped him. This turning point finally the end of Auggie’s painful isolation. His classmates finally accept him as a human being with a heart, a brain, and a great sense of humor in addition to his weird face.
If I had to compare this book to a series similar to this I would compare it to John Green’s the Fault in our Stars because they are both realistic fiction that require them undergo great feats. Also they are both page turners and filled with excitement. Another reason as to why I would compare it to The Fault in our Stars is because the audience of the two books are very similar. The audience is generally teenagers and the book like the Wonder can be finished fairly quickly. They both do not require for you to be very good at reading in order to comprehend the book completely. I noticed/liked how the author tended to make very large problems for the characters to overcome. I was surprised when the author had such brutal/harsh things happen to them. I also liked how he did this because it isn’t something you see every often in books which makes this book more unique compared to other ones. I was also surprised to see so many characters introduced then gone into very deep detail and description of the character then never mentioning that character ever again.
Finally I really enjoyed one of the passages of the book which was “The best way to measure how much you’ve grown isn’t by inches or the number of laps you can now run around the track, or even your grade point average– though those things are important, to be sure. It’s what you’ve done with your time, how you’ve chosen to spend your days, and whom you’ve touched this year. That, to me, is the greatest measure of success.” (p.236)
I really enjoyed this passage because it is very important in the book and not only that but in real life which really struck me. The author’s craft helped make passages like this happen all throughout the book. That is why this book similar to the other books in this series will be one that I will remeber reading fondly. I would rate this book a 8/10 just for how amazing it was.
