Higher Power of Lucky – Review

Reading time:

Synopsis:

Content Warning: (As listed by Storygraph users) Death of parent, Alcoholism, Addiction, Child Abandonment, Injury/Injury detail, Grief, Runaway, Foster care.

Lucky, age ten, can’t wait another day. The meanness gland in her heart and the crevices full of questions in her brain make running away from Hard Pan, California (population 43), the rock-bottom only choice she has.

It’s all Brigitte’s fault — for wanting to go back to France. Guardians are supposed to stay put and look after girls in their care! Instead Lucky is sure that she’ll be abandoned to some orphanage in Los Angeles where her beloved dog, HMS Beagle, won’t be allowed. She’ll have to lose her friends Miles, who lives on cookies, and Lincoln, future U.S. president (maybe) and member of the International Guild of Knot Tyers. Just as bad, she’ll have to give up eavesdropping on twelve-step anonymous programs where the interesting talk is all about Higher Powers. Lucky needs her own — and quick.

But she hadn’t planned on a dust storm.

Or needing to lug the world’s heaviest survival-kit backpack into the desert.

Review:

I read this book for my Newbery read through. It’s a short, powerful, and poignant story. Though for some readers the subject matter, of a girl whose mother dies and is abandoned by her father, may be a tough to handle.

The book deals with coming-of-age issues like belonging and friendship, as well as subject like addiction, grief, and modern poverty.

The citizens of the little town of Hard Pan, a now defunct desert mining town, are an interesting bunch. I enjoyed getting to know the colorful cast of characters, though I can’t help but wonder what keeps them in such a dismal place, with limited prospects. But you get the sense that for them this place is home.

Each of their homes is like a unique character too. Take for instance the home Lucky shares with her guardian Brigette. “a half circle of trailers. First was her little shiny aluminum canned-ham trailer… Next, the long kitchen-dining room-bathroom trailer, and last, Brigette’s Westcraft bedroom… The best part was that you could walk from Lucky’s canned ham to Brigitte’s Westcraft without ever going outside.” pg.7

This book is on some banned books lists – because apparently some people can stand the fact that it mentions a dogs “scrotum.” 🙄 I think, if the kids are old enough to be reading this book, listed as Grades: 4 – 6, they are old enough to learn the anatomical terms for the parts of male and female genitalia. You can read about the controversy here.

The scene in question serves a larger purpose in the narrative of the story. Lucky has a lot of questions rattling around in her brain, ‘what is a scrotum?’ among them. Many 10 year old’s deal with a lot of questions, and are at an age where finding answers can be tricky. Where a younger child might not feel embarrassed to blurt out their inquiries, a 10 year old has learn that some questions cause unwanted reactions. So who do you trust to answer those more sticky questions?

Anyway, I am rambling on. The story is solid, the characters good, and if you have an ounce of empathy this book will hit you hard, and maybe leave you a little better for reading it.

Bottom Line:

A heartfelt coming-of-age tale about finding hope and community.

“It made her feel discouraged, like if you took the word apart into two sections of dis and couraged. It was getting harder and harder to stay couraged.” – Higher Power of Lucky

• Buy The Higher Power of Lucky by clicking this link and Amazon will give me a small commission for referring you.

Note: I do not use AI to assist in writing my blog. The words of this review are my own. The synopsis was taken from Amazon or another book seller.