This has taken me a long time to get to, and in the end I'm going to have to mark this as DNF.

I can't read something like this in a pandemic that's entering its third year and not be a lot biased towards the book.

An incredible futuristic tale that was engaging, creative and enjoyable...yet creepily reminiscent of the 2020 lockdown. Timely for sure, and definitely relatable after what the last year has looked like! Highly recommend!

‪This upcoming sci-fi story by Jake Burt was such a fun adventure! Set in a future where people are isolated to prevent the spread of disease & all supplies are delivered by drones, Cleo ventures outside her home to embark on a life-saving quest. This timely story will keep you turning the pages and will leave you imagining a world where drones do all the work.

Thank you Negalley for the arc! 4 stars! This book was really fun and enjoyable. Cleo is accidentally delivered medicine intended for someone else. In this post-apocalyptic world no one goes outside of their apartment, ever. But Cleo is determined to deliver this medicine and venture outside. Adventure ensues with some new and creative friends. Highly recommend.

A good read for kids that are curious about the pandemic and also want to find heroes. Good action and heart.

I wish I had been able to sit down and just read this book. It took me weeks because I've had so many other responsibilities pulling at me. However, it was very readable and every time I sat down with it I had to make myself stop reading. Cleo's heart and determination, as well as all of her adventures, made this a very enjoyable story that I look forward to sharing with my students.

This book does address a worldwide pandemic, but I think the way it is handled makes it not scary. And really, it is more a device to develop the setting instead of a direct problem for the protagonist.

I think this would probably make a good read aloud for an upper elementary classroom, or an enjoyable read for an independent reader who is looking for a spunky heroine and a touch of sci fi.

I had a lot of fun with this read. Cleo was an inquisitive main character who wasn't satisfied with her parents' answers so she had to go on an adventure herself! I loved her going out to the outdoors/outside with her teachers Mrs. VAIN, and all the people she met - Angie, etc.

I had some trouble with the formatting on my Kindle which meant I didn't read this as quickly as I wanted to. Overall this one will be a good fit for the kids who love adventure stories, science fiction, and pandemics (eek! kinda too close to home with this one for me).

*Thank you NetGalley and publisher for an eARC in exchange for an honest review*

Wow, this book had me on the edge of my seat! For this story being written pre-COVID 19, Cleo’s story about perseverance, compassion, AND change, has never been more relevant. She is such a brave and resilient main character, and I loved watching her figure out how to maneuver getting "outside the wall" and figuring out how to get back home. A fun middle grade sci-fi adventure with some dystopian elements that I think MG lovers will truly enjoy! I would definitely love to see a sequel.

The timing is pretty perfect for Cleo Porter and the Body Electric, a book about a girl who’s lived her entire life in a carefully sealed apartment with no doors and windows so that her family stays protected from the disease that wreaked havoc on the human population a generation before. Cleo, who wants to be a surgeon just like her mom, gets almost all of her human contact online. Then the package comes: A medication that Cleo knows is critical, but it’s come to the wrong address. Cleo has never heard of anything being mis-delivered before, but she’s determined to get the package to the person who needs it — even if it means venturing out of her safe apartment and into the dangerous world outside.

I’d go ahead and just add this one to your readaloud list. Cleo’s adventures feel particularly relevant for our socially distanced world (I love the story of her parents who meet and fall in love online, and then one day they’re delivered to the same sealed apartment), and the book launches some great conversations about what community means, how to deal with pandemics, and what responsibility we humans have to each other. Cleo is a brave, likable kid (assisted by her all-knowing tablet assistant Mrs. VAIN), and her journey takes her to surprising and interesting places — and people. Even if it weren’t particularly timely, I’d recommend this as a charming middle grades speculative fiction, but since it is particularly timely, I can recommend it even more enthusiastically.

This book was pretty fun. It had a lot of strengths for me. I think it was particularly fun given the current environment of our world. What I enjoyed the most was Ms. VAIN, Yorrick, and the outside time with Angie and Paige. However, I found it lacking in a few places as well. I think the book thrived the most during the outside time and so I wish more had been explored during Cleo's escape. I really wanted to know how exactly Angie avoided the apartments and how many more people were out in the world as well. I think there was a lot of potential left unexplored there. I also found the twist at the end a bit flimsy. I wish there had been a better resolution to the whole thing. All in all I enjoyed it, and will recommend it to kids, but just wish there had been a bit more to the story.

I received this e-ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
Twelve-year-old Cleo Porter has never seen the outside – no one has in many decades. A very virulent virus had nearly wiped out humans. So the humans built hermetically sealed apartments -no doors, no windows, everything delivered by drones through a tube leading directly to their home. The humans are nice and safe, right? Until a package of vital medicine is delivered to Cleo’s apartment that was meant for someone else – Miriam Wendemore-Adisa. What’s Cleo to do? She has a very important medical exam that she has been studying weeks for. But Miriam could die without this medicine. Cleo makes a decision that will forever change her world.
According to the author, this book was written before COVID-19 but added some updates to the final manuscript. Despite that, this sci-fi adventure is extremely prescient. The story moves along a quick pace – I would dive right into the next chapter to see what happened next. A great middle-grade book – I would recommend for grades 4 and up.
#CleoPorterAndTheBodyElectric #NetGalley

Thank you, NetGalley & MacKids for giving me an eARC to read!
Cleo Porter and the Body Electric was - according to the author - an idea about a post-pandemic world that he started writing pre-pandemic. But wow do times change, and Cleo’s story about perseverance, compassion, AND change, has never been more relevant.
Cleo is a brilliant kid who, in her house that’s become her whole world, is practicing to become a doctor, an occupation for which she’s on a track that started when she was very young. But it’s Cleo’s compassion and determination that start her on a quest to deliver vital medicine to a woman in her unit when it accidentally gets delivered to the wrong address.
Loved Cleo. Strong female protagonists are fantastic. Her journey developed not only her emotional strength, but her physical strength in ways she didn’t realize she needed, as well as her ability to see things from a completely different perspective. The ending is something the kids won’t see coming, and is a lesson for us all.
The only reason I gave this book four stars because some of the descriptions were a bit difficult to follow (world-building is HARD) and lengthy, and it made men wonder if that might make some kids put the book down. Other than that, I loved it and will definitely be adding it to my classroom library when it’s our next month!

Jake Burt stories will always belong in my room. At a time when students need to escape reality, I loved this world that Jake build with Cleo Porter and the Body Electric. I love how set ahead in the future the story is, but the underlying themes and tones that reside in the story are ones that students are all going to love/enjoy. Very timely opportunities to discuss fear, isolation, death, and coping mechanisms.

A fun middle grade sci-fi adventure with some dystopian elements. Though this interesting and timely concept for a setting inspires a lot of questions that we don’t get answers to, readers who join Cleo on this ride won’t be disappointed. Solid choice for kids looking for dystopian fiction but aren’t ready for YA yet. Reviewed from advance reading copy from NetGalley.

I received an electronic ARC from Macmillan Children's Publishing Group through NetGalley.
Reminds me of "The Machine Stops" by E.M. Forster written for middle grade readers. Cleo receives a package meant for someone else. She is determined to leave her family's pod and make sure this woman gets her life saving medicine. Her actions take her beyond the building and into the "outside." There, she meets Angie - a survivor of the severe flu that drove people into these sealed buildings and Paige - a young child who escaped from one when the building's life sustaining equipment broke down. With their help, she gets back inside and delivers the medicine to the right pod. It turns out this was all a test to see if she would advance in her medical studies.
Readers see Cleo fight challenging odds and problem solve to defeat machines in order to complete her journey. She learns about herself and what she values through the trials involved. Readers also see her carve her own path as she chooses to live inside but retain contact with her friends outside the building structure to end the book.
Burt captures the sterile and mechanical feel of living within one space with no human contact beyond your immediate family. All contact is done via simulations. His descriptions let readers see this world and make their own decisions about how they would fit there.

Kids looking for an adventure will enjoy Cleo's journey out of the safety of her sanitized apartment building into the great unknown to deliver a life-saving package. Add in a drone as a sidekick, an AI assistant, and monstrous machines, and readers will be drawn in to this subtly post-apocalyptic tale. Astute readers won't miss the parallels to the present. #netgalley

I'm IN LOVE w CLEO PORTER AND THE BODY ELECTRIC! Cleo is brave, smart, caring and because of that goes on a life changing adventure that opens her eyes. Post-pandemic world has Cleo living in an apartment with her parents that they never leave. When a life or death package gets sent to them by accident, Cleo takes it upon herself to fix the mistake and save the day. I couldn't get enough of Cleo. I HOPE there is going to be a second book! Can't wait for my students to read this!

This one captured my attention immediately. Cleo lives about 50 years in the future from 2020 and there has been a terrible, deadly flu pandemic that has forced people to live in isolation only with their immediate family members--sounds familiar right? Cleo lives with her parents in an apartment in a large apartment building where all of their supplies are delivered via drone and they cannot leave--she has never been outside. All of her experiences outside of their apartment and interactions with friends are via a simulator and both of her parents work from their home. She is preparing for an exam to begin studying to be a surgeon like her mother.

When a package of important medicine arrives down their chute, Cleo becomes concerned. It seems to have been wrongly delivered and she is consumed about the patient not receiving their life-saving drugs. Her parents leave her to problem-solve and she opts to escape with the medicine via their chute in order to transport the medication. On her brave adventure, Cleo learns about the workings of the drones and the apartment building. She also makes it outside where she gets to feel grass and sunshine for the first time…

I really enjoyed this book! It got a little slow in the middle, but it picked up when Cleo made it out of the building and then had to figure out how to get back in. I think many of my 4th and 5th grade students will really enjoy this especially with the pandemic parallels to 2020--I am planning to begin the school year with it as my read aloud!

I love how this exciting read takes place within one building and the areas right outside it. Very creative story and well-developed characters that you were rooting for. It was interesting that the book focused on one girl and her small mission, even though the back story itself could make it's own book. Even though it could be classified as dystopian due to the setting, the story felt positive and uplifting. I really enjoyed this book and would highly recommend it.

Jake Burt’s books are always an insta-read for me and this new title is no different. It’s filled with adventure and heart. Young readers will love following Cleo along on her journey and will root for her the whole way. It will be interesting to hear students’ perspectives on this book given the current situation and I think that makes this title all the more appealing to readers. Highly recommend.