I had hoped this book would be great but it just kind of missed the mark. I read a lot of middle grade and this one just didn't pull me in or deal with the issue of having and not having in a way that was accessible. I found the writing to be a bit clunky and wasn't invested in the characters.

If you want to read a book that has characters that deal with not having enough, I enjoyed No Fixed Address much more.


Thank you to #NetGalley, the publisher and the author for an advance e-copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada , but man oh man, this book felt like a bunch of random ideas cobbled together. I often enjoy middle grade fiction, however there were so many things happening here that the plot never did pull me in. And Rupert's everlasting hunger, that was just too much for me to bear.

This was an unusual story. It follows many adventures that Rupert has with the members of the Rivers family.

Rupert comes from a very poor family. They eat oatmeal for every meal because they can’t afford much else. The Rivers family is the opposite. They have every extravagance possible. Rupert ends up spending Christmas with them, but his great evening takes a horrible turn when Rupert loses all of the prizes he won in the games. Then over the following weeks, the members of the Rivers family try to make up for taking all of Rupert’s gifts away.

I found this story very strange. The Rivers family kept dangling gifts and food in front of Rupert but didn’t actually give them to him. It was so cruel. There were some fantasy elements like time travel, but these moments didn’t fit in with the rest story because the rest of it was fairly realistic.

This story reminded me of some other children’s stories. Rupert’s family is in the same unfortunate situation as Charlie Bucket’s family in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The narration style and circumstances of Rupert’s life were like the Beaudelaire children in A Series of Unfortunate Events. However, I found this book was missing the excitement and redemption that these stories had.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley.