Review: Stand Tall by Joan Bauer

Tree, a six-foot-three inch twelve-year-old, copes with his parents' recent divorce and his failure as an athlete by helping his grandfather, a Vietnam vet and recent amputee, and Sophie, a new girl at school









I had some problems with this book but overall 3 stars!
Characters: The characters were alright though I didn't find anything special about any one of them. Tree was good, I think he acted as anyone would, with his height, his parents' divorce, and his grandfather's rehab to learn to walk again. His brothers' Curtis and Larry were especially my favorite characters. Even though we only saw them for a little bit you could tell how much they loved their family and how much the divorce hurt them even though they don't show them. Tree's parents were alright. Though I honeslty didn't like his mother. It seemed to me that she was always so unreasonable and I got really annoyed by her. I also really enjoyed Tree's friends Eli, Sully, and Sophia. I liked how you could see that they were true friends and wouldn't leave his side when he most needed them. All the characters acted as normal teenagers or preteens would act. Thats what I most liked about the characters, how believable and relatable they were.

Plot: There really wasn't a plot, I mean the whole story focused on how Tree survives his year with all that goes on in his life. I am a plot driven girl. I like stories with good plots with a twist and I don't think this book really had that. I did like the fact that this author constantly compared life with war. I never really thought about it like that but the more I think the more I know its true. I thought that throughout the book Tree (Real name, Sam) would progress into being comfortable with himself but one chapter to another he went from shy to outgoing and that change was to abrupt for my liking. The pace of the book was fast but not that much. The writing style was alright it was very simple. It was just like any other book. Didn't have anything special that I could say only that book had.

Overall: Overall this book had a lot of problems but I still liked the self impowerment. How it teaches you that you are equal to everyone else and you should like yourself no matter you size, height, or appearance. I liked many of the characters and I also very much liked that there wasn't any romance. I love romance don't get me wrong but sometimes romance did get very annoying so this is a nice break. Any age can read this. I highly recommend this, even if you don't like anything about this book focus on the message and it'll make the book all the much better.