10 LUCKY THINGS THAT HAVE HAPPENED TO ME SINCE I NEARLY GOT HIT BY LIGHTNING

Hershey’s hilarious sequel to My Big Sister Is So Bossy She Says You Can't Read this Book (2006) throbs with energy and narrator Effie’s warm, sarcastic wit. Life goes on with her now-divorced dad in prison, but Effie’s more exuberant because she has two tremendous best friends. She gets worried, however, when best friend Aurora wants to transfer to a school with a hot basketball team and escape the boys at St. Dom’s who tease her about her burgeoning breasts. In solidarity, Effie and her other best friend Nit don empty bras that create slight bumps under their shirts. Effie is further unnerved when Mom invites a college friend to take sanctuary in their home while he struggles with his vocation as a Catholic priest, and her older sister begins to affect religious behavior. Effie agonizes about the possibility that her mother may be falling for another loser like dad. All Hershey’s characters are complex people, but it is Effie’s unique fourth-grade wisdom and way with words that will touch readers’ hearts and funny bones. (Fiction. 9-11)