Mallory in Full Color

Gr 5 Up–Mallory, 12, knows what everyone else likes, wants, needs, leaving little space to know her own self. The one thing that’s truly hers alone, though, is creating her (secret) webcomic; to post it, she “straight-up lied” to bypass the minimum age requirement. Mendacity has become a default response: she tells Mom she’ll return to swim team but skips practices after sneaking into Mom’s work account and emailing the coach confirming a schedule change. She promises her new friend (and crush?) she’ll perform the duet at the library drag show even though audiences paralyze her. Truths eventually expose her deceptions, leading to appropriate consequences, but also toward hopeful, freeing self-realizations. Wong is a fine emotional cipher, but her distorted pronunciation of Korean words and phrases can be distracting; Wong’s polyglot fluency does not include Korean.