Book Description
for Peanut by Ayun Halliday and Paul Hoppe
From Cooperative Children's Book Center (CCBC)
A family move provides Sadie with the perfect opportunity to create a new-if misguided-school persona. By faking a severe peanut allergy, she'll be interesting to her new classmates and earn their instant sympathy. And in fact, although the mean girls she meets initially aren't worth the effort, Sadie does make a few new friends and even acquires an origami-folding, Luddite boyfriend named Zoo. However, trying to stay true to her peanut-allergy alter ego is a challenge. Not only does she have to constantly remember her "condition," Sadie has to side-step the school nurse's increasingly urgent requests for a health form signed by her mom. The charade is exposed when a teacher believes Sadie has eaten a bake-sale cupcake containing nuts. Paramedics are called to the school, and soon everyone knows Sadie has lied. Her new friends are furious and Zoo feels betrayed. Sadie's humiliation and regret are painfully credible, but a glimmer of hope for the future sparks when Zoo makes an overture to stay connected. This fast-paced graphic novel employs a piece of red clothing to make Sadie immediately identifiable in the otherwise black-and-white illustrations. (Age 13 and older)
CCBC Choices 2014. © Cooperative Children's Book Center, Univ. of Wisconsin - Madison, 2014. Used with permission.