This was an enjoyable story. All the characters were so vivid and distinct. I especially loved the parts describing the spelling bees. It reminded me a little of that documentary Spellbound. And maybe this is because I’ve been reading so many kids’ books lately, but I kind of wished the book would’ve stayed in that realm. It started getting depressing around the middle (yeah, yeah, I know that’s life sometimes) but it was a little too much for my taste. I didn’t feel like the payoff at the end was enough to compensate for all that pain and sadness in the main character’s family. But still, I did enjoy the story and I’m probably just not calibrated to adult novels right now.