Fish in a Tree

Review ebook Fish in a Tree

Soooo….black sheep here in a big way, but I”m completely at a loss to explain why this has an average of nearly 4.5 stars. I actually ALMOST gave it 2 stars, but thought maybe I was being too nitpicky about the biggest problems I had with the book (see below). I still might come back and do that, but thought I would give myself some time to consider.

ETA: DAYS of considering this book in more detail has convinced me that I can’t leave this at three starts so I’ve dropped it to my original thou Soooo….black sheep here in a big way, but I”m completely at a loss to explain why this has an average of nearly 4.5 stars. I actually ALMOST gave it 2 stars, but thought maybe I was being too nitpicky about the biggest problems I had with the book (see below). I still might come back and do that, but thought I would give myself some time to consider.

ETA: DAYS of considering this book in more detail has convinced me that I can’t leave this at three starts so I’ve dropped it to my original thought of two.

Overall this book is fine. It’s a little long for the story it’s telling. (I’m always amused by the irony of a book written about a dyslexic student that a dyslexic student would break out in hives at the thought of being made to read it.) There are places where it reads like an American Girl movie (if the girl of the year ever came from a working class family) minus the musical numbers. Mostly I felt like it was more of a book for teachers. Or students majoring in education. With an incredibly unrealistic look at how bullying works and is resolved.

My (possibly) nitpicky major issue:
I’m a military brat myself and I was majorly distracted though the majority of this book by how WRONG Hunt got that. I must add the disclaimer that I’m an Air Force brat, but my father was once stationed at a base on an Army post so I’m fairly familiar with Army culture too.
Problems:
*Army families do not PCS every year. It would be every two years AT MOST. (one year deployment, one year on post for the active duty member). And the Army actually changed that policy in 2013 to every 3-4 years so families would have more stability.
*WHY was Ally the only military kid in her class????? Laughs forever at this. Even off post schools in a system with a military presence have a TON of military kids in them (and they tend to stick together). (And not all posts have DoD schools.) Seriously. If you’ve ever been to a military town, you know how much it affects the entire town’s culture. Which leads me to…
*Where were they living? There is absolutely no mention in Ally’s family of things that are par for the course to military dependents. If they weren’t even living at/near the post where her father was officially stationed, why were they moving so much? Why did they have to go to a friend’s house for internet?
*Unless I’m much mistaken (and I did double check to be sure about this), Army tanks don’t have captains. They have commanders. (They wouldn’t call it a captain because that is an officer rank and there are no officers in a tank crew. The commander of the tank is the highest ranking enlisted person on the crew.) And you can’t fob me off by telling me Ally might be confused. When you are the kid of a career military person, you know their rank and their job.
*Maybe Ally’s dad was National Guard called to Active but that REALLY doesn’t explain why the family was moving every year. And even then a tank commander is usually a sergeant (I believe) and that’s not a very high enlisted rank. And if you don’t make your next rank in a certain number of years, you have to get out. Judging on Ally’s brother’s age, her dad can’t be super young. But maybe he jus signed up later?

I know people will say it doesn’t matter but it was a MAJOR distraction for me. (As you can probably tell.)

Minor (possibly) nitpicky bother:
OF COURSE it was a male teacher who rode in on his white horse to save the day. Because the women teachers are too distracted by their babies and what not. Blech all over that. …more