This book felt like a three star through most of it, but it finished very strong and a complex, ambiguous, but ultimately happy resolution. Good books will have that hook where I can't wait to read the rest, and this didn't really hit that until 80 or 90 percent through.

I thought it was an interesting choice that, while Yaqui had a little dialogue toward the end, she never got to speak substantively, and the reader saw her exclusively through Piddy's point of view. I expected them to do the humanize-the-bully thing where they talk about her bad home situation, and that was glanced at, but never really carried through. We saw Yaqui only through Piddy's view and, to Piddy, Yaqui is just a monster. And the book tells you it's okay to feel like that, but at the same time has the character of Joey, who comes from similar or worse circumstances that Yaqui, but manages to be a caring person.

It also teaches kids that it's okay to leave a bad situation, and I think that's a good lesson.

The cover blurb says "complicatedly true", which nails it.