Counting by 7s: A Summer Blogger Book Club Review

Hello there fellow wanderlusters!
I just realized I haven't ever done a review on my blog. Then I thought it would be a good idea to do a review on the book I read for the Summer Blogger Book Club. Maybe I'll put it out on Second Look, the collab reviewing blog I'm doing with Oakstar and Amelie, but I'm not sure.

Counting by 7s Holly Goldberg Sloan

Age Recommendation
The content would be appropriate for kids 8 & up, but I think it would be best for the 10-13 age range. Younger kids might not understand the concept or might be deeply affected by the deaths in this book, but they can go ahead and read it.

Is it inappropriate?
No, not much inappropriate content. There's no swearing, and just a few references to giving birth without being married and fertility, but it's mostly clean.

Summary

Willow Chance is a 12-year-old genius, obsessed with nature and diagnosing medical conditions, who finds it comforting to count by 7s. It has never been easy for her to connect with anyone other than her adoptive parents, but that hasn't kept her from leading a quietly happy life... until now. Suddenly, Willow's world is tragically changed when her parents both die in a car crash, leaving her alone in a baffling world.

Rating
5 stars!

Review
This is, in all honesty, my favorite stand-alone book. Willow is such an amazing character, and the way that Mai and Dell and Quang-ha and Pattie (who all choose to care for her following her parents' death) show her compassion is beautiful. The book has fantastic messages about how we cannot be defined by one label. Would I recommend this book to a friend? Definitely. It's quite funny, too!
This might not be such a great review in the sense that I gave the book five stars, since you might find something you dislike in the book making this inaccurate, but it's such an incredible summer read.