August has been homeschooled his entire life because he's had so many surgeries. He declines to describe what his face looks like, insisting that it's probably worse than whatever the reader is imagining. He's ten years old, and though he feels normal, he wishes he had a 'normal' face. Miranda: Extraordinary, but No One There to SeeĪugust introduces himself to the reader.Jack: Why I Didn't Sit with August the First Day of School.August: Jack Will, Julian, and Charlotte.I think that Wonder deserves to be an international bestseller as it will hook everyone who reads it. I would give this book five stars and consider it to be equally as good for boys and girls. No one could say that Wonder creates a nice world for the unfortunate protagonist, but something even more deeply rooted than the sadness in the book definitely prevails and that is the sense of love and goodness that leaves you infused with inspiration and appreciation for the good things. It manages to be about a person with an unlucky and rare syndrome, who we love not out of sympathy (although this book oozes reality and raw emotion) but out of love for him. However I found instead that I enjoyed it because it is written with such charm and heart, even in the sad parts.

If someone had told me about the topic of this book before I read it, I think I would have mostly chosen to read it because I did not want to walk away from the sad truths and I owed it to people who have similar problems to August. But August is a boy who can't be hushed into silence or invisibility in his world, simply because of the way he looks. Wonder is about something that we don't like to talk about because it is so rare and so sad. This book gives a realistic look at the frankly brutal reality that is a hugely hushed topic in childrens books. So surely, middle school is the last place he could ever hope to be normal … right? Not only is he nervous for the same reasons as every other child in his new class but because August cannot walk down the corridor without being the subject of stares and cruelty.Īugust lives in a brutal world. When August begins at middle school, he is nervous. What were the chances that Auggie's face turned out the way that it did? The face of a boy who was unlucky enough to get a double dose of a mutant gene that makes him and his family not so ordinary after all. His protective big sister, Via feels angry when people stare and his parents love him yet cannot help but argue about whether August should go to school. Things are tough for August and his family too. He plays ball and has an Xbox but despite 27 operations, he will never look normal. August is ten years old and he does the normal things that other ten year olds do.

Wonder by R.J. Palacio