Hound Dog True by Linda Urban

Linda Urban has an amazing view into a young girl's inner thoughts.  In both her first novel, A Crooked Kind of Perfect, which won several awards, and this one, we see the main characters' little emotional waves and tides--what they hope and think will happen, and how they feel when it does or doesn't.  In this book 11 year old Mattie lives with her mother, and has moved a lot. She is a shy girl and making friends is agonizing for her.  She and her mother come to live one summer in her mother's family home with her uncle who is a janitor at the local grade school.  Mattie decides that if she can become her uncle's special janitor's helper, she can hang around with him before and after school, and during lunch and she won't have to face the other kids at her new school. She is a sweet and intelligent girl, but is so insecure that any other child would actually like her, especially her new next door neighbor who is older than her and looks like a teenager.  I really liked this book.  It deals with bullying and its aftermath, but that is in the background.  It is really about learning and daring to hope again that someone actually might be willing to be your friend. (152 p)