Firegirl

Most Recently Read Book:

Firegirl

 

By Tony Abbott

I did a book talk for my students on Friday and we were talking about Jerry Spinelli who wrote Stargirl and Love, Stargirl and they mentioned Firegirl.  Of course, I had to go and get it from the library!  Firegirl is actually completely different from Stargirl and yet somewhat similar actually.  Firegirl is about a 7th grader whose class gets a new girl one day, except this new girl has suffered severe burns all over her body.  The main character, Tom, is so interested in this new girl, Jessica, but not really sure how to be friends with her.  No one feels comfortable around her and they all come up with crazy reasons to explain how she got all the burns.  Tom ends up distancing himself from his friends because they are so immature around Jessica.  He becomes friends with her and finds out the truth about her burns.  In the end, Tom accepts Jessica and learns what it means to be a friend.  

This book reminded me of Stargirl a little bit because Stargirl is about a girl who completely walks to the tune of a different drummer and she ends up shaking up the high school that she moves to because she is so eccentric.  Both of them teach a lesson in accepting others despite their differences.  (Stargirl is still one of my favorites, although I'm not sure I would say the same about Firegirl.)