We Dream of Space: A Newbery Honor Award Winner

For those who like unrelieved bleak ending in tragedy, this is the book for you.The author has fashioned a colorless January of ennui endured by yet another dysfunctional family. They should have been wearing body cameras so you could see the blank expressions on their faces.Surprisingly, the book has vacuumed up a number of writing prizes including recent selection as a Newbery Honor Book. Perhaps this is so because in this age of pandemic, insurrection, power outages, and vanishing jobs “We Dream of Space” is the closest thing to Mary Poppins in the New Normal.The parents in the book are petty, frustrated, bickering and likely two high school graduation days away from divorce. Of the three siblings, one son lives on the edge of volcanic anger. The other son has the academic dynamism of a doorknob. The daughter at the center of the tale, is an emotionally frail dreamer skipping toward catastrophe.As for the book’s structure, a few gratuitous vignettes add nothing to the story. For example, the author plops down a diversion about interracial marriage, then just leaves it there. In another throwaway, she has the young girl open the door of a classmate’s empty house and nap with the cat. Full stop.The book also has factual polyps. On page 90, the middle school teacher tells the class to imagine themselves strapped to a rocket ready to launch from Houston. It would have to be imaginary since rockets are not launched from Houston.Worse, on page 205 is a piece of dialogue where one sibling asks who Sally Ride is. The other sibling says: “The first woman in space.” That answer is wrong. The first woman in space is Valentina Tereshkova.If after looking in on this hangdog collection of undistinguished characters (possibly excepting the teacher), a reader says “nothing happened,” that would be a more suitable title for this book.

First sentence: The pinball machine didn’t steal Fitch Thomas’s quarter. Not really. But when one of the flippers is broken, there’s no point in playing.Premise/plot: We Dream of Space is a middle grade coming of age novel set in January 1986 starring three siblings: Fitch, Bird, and Cash. The book is told from the perspective of all three siblings. Fitch is struggling with anger issues and feelings of shame. Bird is a big, big dreamer but is haunted by insecurity and anxiety. Cash, well, Cash also struggles with finding his place to belong, finding something he is good at; he struggles with worthlessness. The three siblings have so much in common--so so much--but they also share this a feeling of isolation and alone-ness. They seem unaware that their siblings are also struggling and just barely coping. Another thing all three have in common is their parents who always, always, always, always seems to be arguing, fighting, fussing, bickering, spatting, raging. The Nelson-Thomas home is not comfortable, cozy, safe. It's very much a Jekyl-and-Hyde home. (That's how Bird refers to her home).The book deals with their lives at home and at school. The three siblings share one teacher--Ms. Salonga--though not all at the same time period. She is a science teacher, I believe, who is dedicating the whole month of January to space and space exploration. Bird, in particular, is thrilled with this focus. And she daydreams conversations with one of the astronauts, Judith Resnik.It touches on issues of family dysfunction (in particular spousal verbal abuse, and perhaps a bit of neglect), bullying, self-esteem, body image, and friendship. (Not all friends are *good* or *good-for-you* friends. Some relationships are toxic.)My thoughts: We Dream of Space won't satisfy every reader. It ends roughly around the first week of February 1986. There are no pretty little bows tied neatly. Cash hasn't transformed his grades or made the track team...yet. Fitch hasn't figured out how to make amends and reform his outbursts...yet. Bird hasn't made peace with the tragedy of the Challenger and "gotten over" her funk...yet. The parents' relationship hasn't miraculously improved 1010%. There have been no promises to change or acknowledgement that they are hurting each other and the children. But despite the lack of neatness in the bow-tying department, it stays true to life. Problems never resolve quickly and neatly. Not really.It also won't satisfying the nit-pickiest of readers who will notice that the teacher talks of the shuttle launching from HOUSTON, TEXAS. (It should be Cape Canaveral, Florida). If that is the biggest issue you have with the book--that could perhaps be fixed before it goes into paperback or reprinting of a hardcover if this one should win awards.The book offers an emotional roller coaster. The narrative is getting closer and closer and closer and closer to the EXPLOSION which provides its own tension. But that isn't the only tension--far from it. All the relationships in the book are a bit of a mess. This family needs help--an intervention. The home life is toxic and damaging.For those that have--in the past--lived through this it could potentially be a trigger and hit a little too close to home. For those that have never lived through this, I would love to see this book trigger empathy and compassion. The truth is you never know what may be going on in the lives of your classmates. Teachers, you may not know what is going on in the lives of your students.For those that are currently living through this--perhaps this book will help you feel not-alone, perhaps it will help you feel SEEN and HEARD.The three kids--despite being in middle school--desperately needed DAILY TIME with Mister Rogers and His Neighborhood.

I was reading this book and enjoying it until the teacher character instructs her students to imagine themselves strapped to the Space Shuttle Challenger getting ready to launch.... from Houston, Texas. Ugh, no please.

I'm sorry to say my daughter Grace was highly disappointed with this book. She's a huge fan of all things space-related, so that's why I thought this one would appeal to her. She felt that although the writing was good, there was a lot about the plot that was all over the place..her comment was, "there was no point to this book, it just went nowhere." She said there were a lot of storylines left unresolved, like Cash's decision to try track instead of basketball...there was no follow up. Or Finch's apology to Amanda..how she didn't accept it or even acknowledge it. Or how their parents fought horribly, you felt like they were headed for divorce, but then...it just wasn't mentioned again. The end was a tremendous disappointment as Bird flipflopped on her future ambition to be an astronaut, a decision which had no explanation and seemed overly negative. Grace said the book was extremely depressing and she never felt happy reading it, she felt very dragged down by all the negativity in the book. She felt like she wasted her time reading it. Sorry for the bad review..we are huge readers in our family and it kills me to give a poor review. In listening to my daughter talk, it sounds like the book was poorly edited.

Really nyc book for an astrophile...inspiring