Lizzy and the Good Luck Girl by Susan Lubner
Release: November 6th 2018
Format: Ebook
Publisher: Running Press Kids
Source: Netgalley
Lizzy and the Good Luck Girl Synopsis:
Living in the small town of East Thumb, Maine, upstairs from her family’s diner, twelve-year-old Lizzy Sherman searches for signs to guide her and perhaps guarantee her a bump-free path through life. She pays attention to the clouds in the sky, the ice cubes in her water, the heart-shaped puddle of the juice her friend spilled. If only she can figure out what the signs are trying to tell her, she’ll know what to do next.
When Lizzy and her best friend go searching for a stray cat and find a runaway girl instead, they want to help. And when Lizzy notices a tiny four-leaf clover tattooed on the girl’s hand, she knows it’s a sign. Lizzy hides the girl inside her bedroom closet, convinced the girl will be able to protect Lizzy’s family from tragedy. But signs can be tricky, and what the girl has to offer may be more valuable that luck.
Review:
Many thanks to Netgalley in providing me an e-ARC of the book.
To be honest, I did not enjoy reading this book. The concept is interesting, where a girl starts to get good luck when she hides a runaway in her home. However, I did not like the execution and felt that there were many aspects that could have been better.
Let me begin with the character. I found Lizzy to be very hyper and paranoid and found her a bit irritating. She just does whatever she feels like, and there are no consequences to her actions. She is obsessed in listening to signs to tell her if her luck with prosper or not. I really thought she needed help and counselling for her behavior. I also did not like how the author has portrayed the runaway story-line in a very lighthearted manner. The story makes it sound like it is OK for young children to run away from home to teach their parents a lesson. Worst of all, the girls actually get away with it in the end and no body finds out.
However, that is not to say that the story was very bad. I did like Lizzy’s family and her friend Joss. They seemed to be more level headed than she was, and I liked how realistically the family was portrayed. In fact, I would have probably liked the book better if Joss was the main character. There are also quite a few quirky part in the story which I enjoyed, like the different names Lizzy comes up for the food, or the ideas that they have for raising money. I also liked the creative themes that Charlotte comes up with in her art while she is hiding in Lizzy’s room.
Overall, I really wanted to like this book and thought it has a few good scenes here and there, but in general, it seemed like a lot of random things were happening to the characters.
