RaveThe New York Times Book ReviewDiCamillo uses her light touch and boundless humor to deliver the difficult news that adults are fallible and that children must learn to develop an unwavering sense of self-reliance and self-acceptance. Summoning the wit of Flannery O’Connor and the sweet melancholy of John Prine, she elegantly connects her characters’ wild actions to their roiling emotions. She writes with compassion and grace about both childhood traumas and adult transgressions ... There is something wonderfully off-balance about DiCamillo’s storytelling. It allows her characters to sparkle and soar. DiCamillo has called this novel, based partly on her own fatherless Florida childhood, 'the absolutely true story of my heart.' What a beautiful and generous heart it is.
