CLP Teens Blog

Wonderstruck by Brian Selznick

Middle school readers who enjoyed Brian Selznick’s first novel in words and pictures, The Invention of Hugo Cabret, will love his latest release, Wonderstruck. Don’t dismiss this intimidating-looking book because of its size (it’s over 600 pages long); half of the story is told through pictures. Beautiful black and white pencil drawings portray the silent world of Rose, a deaf girl living in 1920s New York. That’s not to say that you’ll fly through her portion of this two-part story, though—some of the drawings are so full of detail and emotion that you may linger on them just as long as if they were a page of text.

Rose flees her home on a solo pursuit to track down her favorite actress, whose life she dutifully immortalizes in a scrapbook. Her adventure is revealed in snippets, broken up by passages of text that chronicle Ben’s life. He is a boy from Minnesota whose mother’s recent passing has made him even more curious to learn about the father he’s never met. A clue as to the mystery man’s identity leads him to embark on his own quest to New York.

The two tales develop independently despite unfolding side by side. Each of the two characters holds their own intrigue, yet the only common thread between them seems to be deafness and New York city, albeit a New York that is decades apart. Just as the book and its two stories begin to run out of pages at an alarming rate, Selznick weaves the two characters together in a masterful and beautiful way that will leave readers with just the feeling that the title promised from the outset. Wonderstruck.

Review by Kelly, CLP-Woods Run