Operation Yes (MG)

Holmes, Sara Lewis. 2009. Operation Yes. Scholastic. 235 pages.

I enjoyed this novel about a so-not-typical sixth grade teacher, Miss Loupe, and her sometimes challenging but mostly well-intentioned class. (It's a school on a military base.) The novel is told through two narrators: Bo, a spirited boy, and Gari, his cousin who has just moved in with them. (Her mom has just been deployed to the war. To Iraq. She's a nurse.) As everyone struggles to adapt, life lessons are learned. (Primarily we learn that everybody is always struggling, always battling something.)

Life isn't always fair. It can sometimes be quite messy, quite puzzling. Bo worries about the future, about his father, about where the next assignment might be. Gari, of course, is worried about her mom. And angry. Very, very angry. Angry that she can't change anything. That her mom has to go to war, no matter how she feels, no matter how her daughter feels. And Miss Loupe, well, her brother is in the war too. And there's always the risk, the chance, that something could happen to him. Life is definitely full of uncertainties. But together both teacher and students can learn from one another on how to live life, really live life.

I would recommend this one.

© Becky Laney of Becky's Book Reviews