Heart finds

With humor and a light touch, this feel-good novel with a personal-growth trajectory captures the sharp edges of a family crisis and shifting sixth-grade social dynamics. In Abner, Okla., word-loving 11-year-old narrator Mabel and her collection-loving grandfather are "urban scavengers" for whom dumpster diving is sport. For them, "heart finds, items that take hold and stir something in our hearts," prove the ultimate trophy. Just as her lifelong best friend Ashley gets sucked into the popular crowd, and a pattern of unkind behavior ensues, Mabel's beloved grandfather experiences a stroke. Suddenly, Mabel must adapt to hospital routines and scary possibilities, and rely more on her sometimes judgmental single mother, a former beauty queen turned wedding planner and tablescaper who favors the perfect and the new. In this shifting whirlwind, Mabel not only finds a few kindred spirit friends but also comes to a deeper understanding of her mom's own wounds and dreams. Berry (Hope Springs) crafts a winning, wise heroine and a heartfelt small-town story that foregrounds the message that "sometimes you don't find what you were looking for, but just what your heart needed." Characters read as white. Ages 8--12. Agent: Kaitlyn Johnson, Corvisiero Agency. (Nov.)

Mabel's sixth grade year challenges her in unexpected ways. Narrator Mabel is bright, observant, and an inveterate punster who wears Doc Martens with everything. The summer's-end change in her lifelong friendship with neighbor Ashley might have been the most bewildering and unpleasant thing that could happen to Mabel at the start of sixth grade. But when her beloved Grampa has a stroke and must move for a time to assisted living, Mabel is distraught and concerned with protecting and defending his collections. A former banker, Grampa has spent recent years scavenging for treasures he finds in dumpsters and at garage sales, repurposing them or sometimes selling them for cash. He and Mabel have had a routine, including weekly visits to a local pawnshop and a thrift store in their Oklahoma town and watching a television show about unexpected finds. He knows "how to take things that look a mess and make them right again." Mabel's relationship with her competitive mother, a talented wedding planner, is less easy and comfortable. Mabel believes if she can help her mother finance her grandfather's care, she can save his house full of salvaged treasures. At the same time, she struggles with navigating her changing friendships and relationship with her sometimes-prickly mom. The characters read White. Sure-handed storytelling and a resilient, extremely likable young hero. (Fiction. 9-13) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.