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Dolores: Seven Stories About Her

Book Summary

Reviewed byMatt Berman
From ages seven to sixteen, Dolores's life is told in seven vignettes, most dealing with foiling those who work against her. At age seven her would-be kidnappers are foiled in a Wal-Mart store. In middle school a mean popular girl fails to make her miserable by spreading false rumors. In high school she avoids a jerk at a party who has bragged that he will score with her that night, and the head of the cheerleading squad who is determined to muzzle her. And in the end she foils an attempted rape.

Is It Any Good?

3

Two-time Newbery Honor author Bruce Books is one of our best writers, but this is not his best work. He did something similar -- a life told in a few vignettes -- far better in the breathtaking What Hearts, which got him one of his Newberys. Here the setups are too obviously designed to show us how wonderful the far-too-wonderful Dolores is, and everything, except for her relationship with her mother (and even there she gets off the best zingers), works out too neatly. She even has a heart-to-heart with a surprisingly introspective bully.

Still, even in his weaker moments Brooks can write better than most authors at their best. The story is engaging and engrossing, peppered with the witty dialogue of smart kids in which the author specializes.

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