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The Only Alien on the Planet
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[+Unofficial Trim] The Only Alien on the Planet / Kristen D. Randle. 3.5 stars
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Man, I loved this book as a teenager, but I've barely thought about it in about 20 years. I feel like it's one of those books that probably deserves a revisit. I'm struggling to remember what the big "mystery" with Smitty was. (view spoiler) I think coming back to this as an adult might give me an entirely new perspective on what was going on. I just remember wishing my high school had cool mysteries to unravel instead of being a terrible slog, so that's probably what appealed to me about it at the time.
To be honest, I don't remember where I heard of this book or when I added it to my tbr, but it was when I was on shelfari. I know it's been on my tbr for a very long time!The "mystery" was (view spoiler). I won't say more in case you do decide to reread, but since you asked. :-)
3.5 stars
When Ginny and her family move across the country when Ginny is in grade 12, she does not want to go, and is lonely. She becomes friends with her neighbour, Caulder. There is an odd boy at school, Smitty, who doesn’t talk. None of the kids have ever known him to talk. Not only that, he doesn’t show emotion or any kind of reaction to anything. He is, however, very smart. Ginny is a bit reluctant, but Caulder insists on introducing her to Smitty. The premise behind them visiting is that Ginny needs help with math (she really does!), and Smitty is able to help by showing her how to figure it out on paper. Caulder and Ginny eventually consider themselves “friends” with Smitty, but something soon goes wrong…
I liked this. Ginny and Caulder frustrated me at times when (I felt that) they pushed Smitty too hard or just couldn’t seem to understand why he was having trouble, but I guess – teenagers? And I sometimes wondered what the psychologist was thinking, but what do I know!? I did love the interactions between Ginny and her brothers, though. The last bit of the book picked up a bit with a confrontation, but it wasn’t quite enough to bring my rating up to 4 stars. 3.5 stars is still good for me, though. I liked it.