The Reinvention of Bessica Lefter

Tracy, Kristen

ISBN 10: 038590634X ISBN 13: 9780385906340

Publisher: Delacorte Pr, 2011

Synopsis

After an unfortunate incident at the hair salon, Bessica is not allowed to see her best friend, Sylvie. That means she's going to start middle school a-l-o-n-e. Bessica feels like such a loser. She wants friends. She's just not sure how to make them.
It doesn't help that her beloved grandma is off on some crazy road trip and has zero time to listen to Bessica. Or that Bessica has a ton of homework. Or that gorgeous Noll Beck thinks she's just a kid. Or that there are some serious psycho-bullies in her classes. Bessica doesn't care about being popular. She just wants to survive—and look cute. Is that too much to ask when you're eleven?
From the Hardcover edition.

About this title

Review

Starred Review, The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, February 2011:
"Bessica's voice is funny, goofy, anxious, and absolutely emotionally authentic...Readers negotiating their own middle-school minefields or soaking up all the preparatory information they can find will breathlessly follow Bessica's escapades."

"From the Hardcover edition."

Starred Review, The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, February 2011:
"Bessica's voice is funny, goofy, anxious, and absolutely emotionally authentic...Readers negotiating their own middle-school minefields or soaking up all the preparatory information they can find will breathlessly follow Bessica's escapades."

From the Hardcover edition.

"Bessica's voice is funny, goofy, anxious, and absolutely emotionally authentic . . . Readers negotiating their own middle-school minefields or soaking up all the preparatory information they can find will breathlessly follow Bessica's escapades." --The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, Starred Review

"Both family and school are believable, but, appropriately, this is all about Bessica, a character whose newfound bear persona schoolmates and readers alike can applaud." --Kirkus Reviews

"Although it's not always easy to like Bessica, it is hard not to laugh with her as she loses her cool in the presence of her hunky teenage neighbor, jump ropes her way into the role of school mascot in furry pants, and tries to make nice with the school bullies. A supporting star of the story is Bessica's tech-savvy grandma, who, even while away on a spelunking trip with her latest man friend, reminds Bessica of the power of positive thinking. Grandma also illustrates the important moral of this story: "Look for happiness and you'll find it."" --Booklist

"A fun and realistic story of a girl reinventing herself. . . . The reader cannot help but cheer her on--her voice is funny and true and very sympathetic. Many a middle school girl will find a piece of herself in Bessica Lefter." --VOYA

"[Bessica] is an "everytween" with the typical myopia of the age, and as such many readers will relate to her struggle to find a place to belong and applaud her hard-won position in the middle-school hierarchy." --School Library Journal

"This is a story about the perils of middle school, with a strong and irresistible protagonist. . . . Bessica's determination is infectious, and courageous. Faced with one humiliation after another, she manages to triumph, and it makes the ending that much more of a payoff. Tracy uses just the right touch of humor to keep the story fun, yet still take seriously some painful side effects of growing up." --Parents' Choice

About the Author

Kristen Tracy grew up in a small town in Idaho, where she learned a lot about bears. Sadly, she was not clever enough to reinvent herself in middle school. Also, technically, Kristen Tracy never went to middle school. She attended North Bonneville Junior High, where she took classes in industrial exploration (which involved lots of saws), Idaho history, public speaking, and keyboarding. Her least favorite class was PE, in which she was forced to run, tumble, hurdle, play shuffleboard, and perform the flexed-arm hang.
From the Hardcover edition.

About this edition

• Publisher: Delacorte Pr
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 038590634X
• ISBN 13: 9780385906340
• Binding: Library Binding
• Number of pages: 305