Shelly's Book Blog

Gennifer Choldenko seems to have a knack for using inventive titles for her books. I really liked Al Capone Does My Shirts, which is about a family who lived on Alcatraz Island in the 1930's, so I decided to read her new one, If a Tree Falls at Lunchtime. This is a YA novel about two 7th-graders at a private school, a white girl named Kirsten and an African American boy named Walk. Many of the kids at Mountain School are quite wealthy. Walk is a "scholarship kid," and is looked down upon by many of the other students. Kirsten is overweight, and her (former?) best friend is now hanging out with the popular girls. Consequently, they both feel like misfits.
Choldenko tells the story in chapters that alternate point of view between Kirsten and Walk. I think this device works well here. Both Kirsten's and Walk's voices seem authentic, and it helps to smoothly advance the story because so much of what happens depends on how these two characters are feeling. There is a deep dark secret revealed toward the end of the story that explains and brings into focus prior events, and I like how everything comes together like this in the end.