"Ten blocks, ten tales, and whole world of heartfelt humanity, Reynolds has done it again in these emotionally authentic interlinked stories about a set of kids making their way home from school."
Winner of CILIP Carnegie Medal 2021 | Longlisted for the UKLA Book Awards 2021
Smart, incisive, brimming with the breath of human experience and written with engaging age-appropriate verve, this clever concept (“a tale told in ten blocks”) is perfectly executed.
For the chorus of kids whose lives play out on these impeccably-written pages, the walk home from school represents a rare time of freedom; a period of limbo between being under the watchful eyes of teachers and parents. Unsupervised, the kids reveal their true selves, most of them dealing with hidden heartache and anxieties alongside goofing around, self-reflecting and navigating their way through Middle School. As always with Jason Reynolds, the characterisation is ingeniously vivid, with deep insights expressed through, for example, the different ways kids open their lockers.
Many of the stories are intensely poignant, such as that of the Low Cuts crew whose bad behaviour is fuelled by a desperate love for their sick parents. The moment it turns out that Bit the hustler is a “son who was scared. A son who loved his mum” is shatteringly powerful. There’s much humour too, such as the laugh-out-loud scene in which smelly Gregory is slathered in VaporRub by friends seeking to beautify him before he visits a girl he’s keen on.
Bittersweet, hard-hitting and powerfully perceptive, these pitch-perfect reader-centric stories shine a light on oft-overlooked lives and ring with empathy and authenticity.
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Parents, siblings, teachers, coaches, nosy neighbours, babysitters - there's not much of your day that isn't dictated by someone else. Unless you walk home from school - walkers have independence - those fifteen-minutes from school to home, completely unsupervised. What waits for them is the mischief of curiosity, allies and enemies, a taste of freedom, and plenty of humour.
The LoveReading4Kids Editorial Team have read and reviewed Look Both Ways and determined it is suitable for children aged 11-12 years old
Look Both Ways features in the following genres: Books to Motivate Reluctant Readers age 11+, Recommendations, Personal Social Health Economic (PSHE), Children’s, Teenage and Educational, School Stories, Children's and Young Adult Fiction, Short Stories, Stories about Family and Friends, Featured Books for 11+ readers
Look Both Ways is available in Paperback, Hardback
Look Both Ways was written by Jason Reynolds and published by Knights Of Media
Look Both Ways has 199 pages
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