REVIEW: Counting by 7s by Holly Goldberg Sloan

Counting by 7s by Holly Goldberg Sloan
RATING: 3 Stars
GENRE: YA Contemporary

FIND IT ON GOODREADS
BUY IT ON AMAZON

Willow Chance is a twelve-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. The triumph of this book is that it is not a tragedy. This extraordinarily odd, but extraordinarily endearing, girl manages to push through her grief. Her journey to find a fascinatingly diverse and fully believable surrogate family is a joy and a revelation to read.

MY THOUGHTS:
Before starting the book, I believed the main plot was going to be focused around Willow's OCD. However, when I started reading it, I discovered otherwise. The main focus of this novel is Willow's journey in the care system after her parents die in an accident and how she copes with her grief by becoming friends with an unusual family.

For me, this book was not necessarily disappointing, but it just wasn't expected. The reason I was attracted to this boo and the reason I decided to pick it up was because I thought it would be interesting to read about a young girl with OCD. As mentioned above, this book is not really about OCD. Afetr reading about Willow and viewing her as a character, she is just built to be a bit socially awkward rather than to have OCD. Even with this, her personality played little part in the novel and it was because of this I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would.

Don't get me wrong, this book was quite good. The writing was beautiful and some of the issues raised regarding labels in society and acceptance were tackled really well. I also enjoyed reading about the family Willow stays with as they were cultured but also portrayed life in poverty in a very heart warming way. Willow as a character was hard to warm to and can be annoying at times but this may just be to build into her socially awkward persona.

Counting by 7s is a brilliantly written book but the plot and emphasis within the novel was not what I was expecting and therefore I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I would.