Appetizer: As a freshman, Lucky Linderman took a vow to stop smiling. Since the age of seven, he has been bullied. His tormentor, a boy named Nader, has always gotten away with his pranks, bullying and threats.The one person who seems to help Lucky is his grandfather. A prisoner of war in Vietnam who visits with Lucky in his dreams.
When Nader's bullying grows worse, Lucky's mom uproots them both for a vacation and Lucky finds himself guided by his uncle and maybe even facing a romance.
Opening Quotation:
"All I did was ask a stupid question.
Six months ago I was assigned the standard second-semester freshman social studies project at Freddy High: Create a survey, evaluate data, graph data, express conclusion in a two-hundred-word paper. This was an easy A. I thought up my question and printed out 120 copies.
The question was: If you were going to commit suicide, what method would you choose? (p. 3)
My Thoughts: I really liked that Everybody Sees the Ants took on the issue of bullying. I also liked that it would lend itself to discussing the Vietnam War.
A.S. King's writing was clear. She created a great voice for Lucky.
However, the magical realism of Lucky's conversations with his grandfather did not work for me at all.
Nonetheless, check this one out! I was glad the Cybils Award gave me an excuse to pick it up.
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