Newbery Buzz: The Center of Everything

Betsy and I are back to dialogue about childrens’ books that the American Library Association may delight to honor.  This year’s ALA Youth Media Awards will be announced on Jan. 27 (and in connection with that, we have our own exciting announcement to make–stay tuned!)  For today, a middle-grade realistic novel with a dash of the transcendent:

The Center of Everything, by Linda Urban.  Harcourt, 2013, 194 pages.  Age/interest level: 9-13.

Janie: In the beginning, there was the donut.  At first the donut was without form, a shapeless blob of dough, fried in fat or one sort or another . . . . 

And so it remained through the ages, from the ancient Greeks and Mayans all the way down to Captain Cornelius Bunning, who discovered donuts to be just the thing to save his beloved ship Evangeline from a wild storm off the coast of New England.  So goes the founding legend of Bunning, NH, and its semi-deification of the Captain, a kind of god-of-the-storm who lends his name both to the town and to the town‘s annual community festival in June.  Ruby Pepperdine, whose family owns and runs Pepperdine Motors, is this year’s Bunning Days Essay Girl—winner of the annual contest whose public reading forms the climax of the parade.  But she’s not as ecstatic as she should be, since her beloved grandmother, Gigi, was recently lost to a heartbreaking degenerative illness.  The loss is made worse by Ruby’s impression that she let Gigi down in her final hours, and now time itself is out of joint.  Her last minutes with Gigi sped by so fast they were hardly minutes.  But since Gigi died, since Ruby made her wish, they have stretched so much that it feels like they are still happening.  In her thoughts.  In her dreams.  In the poke, poke, poke of right now.  “It’s all coming together,” Gigi had gasped.

The story, unfolding over a single day with flashbacks, is beautifully written with appealing characters and a realistic situation brushed with the epic and mythic.  The opening sentences, with their Genesis echo, should give us a clue.   But all we get are clues.  In a way, that’s fine, because fiction is not for providing answers but for asking the right questions.  The Center of Everything reminds me of The Higher Power of Lucky (Newbery winner for 2006), cut from the same mythic/heroic cloth in which an everyday heroine searches for the meaning of life.  Lucky has her higher power and Ruby has her primeval donut, which Capt. Bunning dignified with a hole.  Nothing occupies the hole—that’s for Ruby, and the reader, to fill up.  What struck you most about this story, Betsy?

Betsy: Mmmm, donuts. I definitely wanted a donut when I finished this book! The donut forms an interesting extended metaphor throughout the book, and it works well. It’s quirky and kid-friendly enough to make the metaphor more approachable to most middle grade readers than the National-Book-Award-winning The Thing About Luck. The Newbery committee folks look for “distinguished” books, and this book is certainly distinguished in its use of point of view. Urban jumps around with the point of view–even using second person, but she makes it work. This is a contemplative book for kids who enjoy reading and thinking. Ruby Pepperdine is so true to life and to the average middle school experience: she’s beginning to realize the universe is a lot bigger than she thought it was, that her parents and family members are real individuals (not just “Dad” or “Mom”), that she can think for herself, and that sometimes relationships really take work. It’s interesting that in light of today’s pro-homosexual climate and this book’s emphasis on relationships that Ruby’s friend’s family situation (two dads) gets little to no attention. Perhaps that, in itself, is a testimony to our society’s bland acceptance of such families, Janie. What do you think? 

Janie: I think our society is not quite to the point of bland acceptance, but movies, TV, and novels are pushing us that way.  I just read Billy Miller’s Big Year, by Kevin Henkes (also a Newbery contender)—it’s written for early elementary grades (ages 6 to 9) and it also drops casual mentions of a friend’s same-sex parents.  Expect to see more of that.  In fact, expect to see a main character with same-sex parents very soon.  Open-ended families are clearly a result of the kind of open-ended spirituality that The Center of Everything projects.  Just what is the “Center of Everything”?  That’s left up to the reader.  You find the center by coming together, as Gigi said: come together under stars and fireworks.  Or love and friendship.  Or . . . something.  It’s a good book to read and think about, but it should also be talked about—this is a book where the Christian reader really needs to think about the worldview and what’s being said.   

Previously we talked about The Real Boy and Flora & Ulysses.  And we’ll be back for more!