Book Review: Sweetness All Around by Suzanne Supplee

Publisher’s description

An indomitable heroine who believes she is destined to find her kidnapped neighbor leads this warm, big-hearted story with irresistible characters and a captivating mystery.

Almost-eleven-year-old Josephine is NOT pleased to be moving into the Happy World trailer park over the summer of 1974. She misses her beautiful bedroom with ballerinas on the wall and her pretty, well-dressed friends. Happy World isn’t happy. It’s dingy and depressing! Nothing like the world that headstrong Josephine wants for herself.

But when Josephine learns that her would-be next door neighbor in Happy World was kidnapped months ago, she develops a begrudging interest in her new home. A kidnapping is exciting—and all signs point to Josephine being meant to find ten-year-old Molly.

Despite her efforts to stay detached, Josephine investigates Molly’s disappearance with help from the eccentric cast of characters living in Happy World. It turns out the rough edges of her community are softer and sweeter than they first seemed. And the unexpected friendships she forms might be more precious than anything she’s ever owned.

In her extraordinary middle grade debut, Suzanne Supplee brings a small Tennessee town and its memorable residents to life. Perfect for daydreamers and unstoppable imaginations. Hand this beautiful, bursting-with-feelings read to fans of Kate DiCamillo’s Raymie Nightingale series.

Amanda’s thoughts

So, when I’m writing this review, it’s the first day I have felt among the living after a week of being nailed by a virus nightmare plus a sinus catastrophe. I slept through the night instead of just coughed, so I woke up rested and with a relatively clear brain for the first time in days and days. As a result, I was able to read! So I stayed in bed (because the chiweenies were content, so why move?) and read this whole book.

And it was great.

The setting, the voice, and the characters all LEAP off the page. I just loved Josephine. She’s a complicated kid, full of anger and resentment and love and hope. She’s pretty cranky about having to move to the trailer park, she isn’t always kind to her mother or her only real friend, Lisa Marie, and she is prone to being judgmental and thinking mean things. BUT. Come on. She’s a kid. She’s been through a lot. And now she’s living in a trailer park where a girl her age was kidnapped. Well, since Josephine considers herself “trying to get clarification” and not “nosy,” it’s the perfect distraction from her own woes. She’ll just solve the mystery of where Molly’s been taken. No biggie. She begins to befriend Molly’s mother and others in the park, which, of course, helps her start to overcome her initial thoughts about all of them and the trailer park.

No one in this story has it easy. There’s poverty, divorce, incarceration, death, illness, and, of course, abduction. But through it all Josephine begins to learn how people can truly care for and support each other, how people are often so willing to help in whatever little way they can. Happy World trailer park is not necessarily where Josephine wanted to be, but it becomes clear that this is now her community, these are her people. And if she can help bring home a missing girl, a new potential best friend? All the better. A great read.

Review copy (ARC) courtesy of the publisher

ISBN-13: 9780823453696
Publisher: Holiday House
Publication date: 10/24/2023
Age Range: 8 – 12 Years

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