I think this book is so powerful. When I bought the book, I initially thought is was a novel with long chapters, until I flipped through it. I was shocked to find that instead it was a novel in poetry. I really enjoyed the poems. They were short yet powerful, and I could relate to Jack. I too felt the same way about poetry when I was his age. When he responded to the teacher questioning of why, with “the wheelbarrow guy didn’t have to tell why” I was literally laughing out loud because I know how he felt. I never cared why the author wrote the poem, I either liked it or not, and didn’t enjoy breaking down the poems.
I love how he changed throughout the book from hating poetry to embracing reading and writing poetry. Jack was so excited about the visiting author and afterwards his willingness to write only grew. I never expected what happened to Sky. I was shocked but thought that by using poetry it helped him to cope with his pain.
I can see myself using this book in the future to show my students that everyone can write poetry and with the help of classic poetry they can too be authors.
