Ellie Engle saves herself! / Leah Johnson.
Record details
- ISBN: 9781368085557
- ISBN: 1368085555
- Physical Description: 275 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm
- Edition: First edition.
- Publisher: Los Angeles : Disney/Hyperion, an imprint of Buena Vista Books, Inc., 2023.
- Copyright: ©2023
Content descriptions
General Note: | Title appears as "Ellie Engle saves the world" with "the world" crossed out and replaced with "herself!" |
Target Audience Note: | Ages 8-12. Disney HYPERION. Grades 4-6. Disney HYPERION. |
Search for related items by subject
Subject: | Ability > Juvenile fiction. Heroes > Juvenile fiction. African American girls > Juvenile fiction. Best friends > Juvenile fiction. Friendship > Juvenile fiction. Magic > Juvenile fiction. |
Genre: | Fantasy fiction. Novels. |
Available copies
- 7 of 8 copies available at Missouri Evergreen. (Show)
- 0 of 1 copy available at Cass County.
Holds
- 0 current holds with 8 total copies.
Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Status | Due Date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Cass County Library-Northern Resource Center | J JOH 2023 (Text) | 0002206298214 | Juvenile Fiction | Checked out | 05/18/2024 |
Kirkus Review
Ellie Engle Saves Herself
Kirkus Reviews
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
A seventh grader doing her best to navigate middle school, a secret crush, and new family dynamics wakes up with a life-altering superpower. Elliot "Ellie" Engle, a 12-year-old Black girl, has always been fine fading into the background with her comic books. Best friend Abby Ortega, who is cued as Latine, always seems to have the spotlight. Following an earthquake during a sleepover at Abby's house, Ellie wakes up feeling weird. She returns home to find her beloved pet, Burt the Betta Fish, has died. While giving his eulogy, Ellie touches Burt, and, to her disbelief, he bounces back to life. Superhero-loving Ellie's first thought is to keep her new abilities a secret or risk being shipped off to some institution like the X-Men's Xavier Institute. But she tells Abby--incidentally her crush and therefore the object of her other big secret. Together, they attempt to test her powers, until an unfortunate incident on frog dissection day in science class throws Ellie's life into a tailspin. Ellie must come to terms with hard truths, but along the way she learns she doesn't have to live her life in the shadow of others and that true friends will support you through everything. This fast-paced, humorous novel will have readers racing to the end as they fall in love with Ellie's quirky and authentic personality. Johnson deftly explores identity and responsibility to ourselves and others in this joyful coming-of-age story. Marvelous. (author's note) (Fiction. 8-12) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
BookList Review
Ellie Engle Saves Herself
Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
At first, Ellie Engle's world is relatively simple. She is an avid comic book fan, and she has one friend, Abby, who is bold, fashionable, and, unlike Ellie, constantly in the spotlight. Ellie is fine with the simplicity of her life, and in fact, she prefers it. When an earthquake shakes her town for the first time in decades, it also shakes up Ellie's life: she's surprised to find that she wakes up with the power to bring dead things back to life. Ellie is immediately overwhelmed with her new powers. She was already beginning to struggle with the prospect of starting junior high, her developing feelings for her best friend, and the stress of helping her single mom, who is barely making ends meet. Now, she finds herself having to come to terms with the reality of being a bona fide superhero--and the spotlight, which she never wanted, that comes with it. This delightful, magical middle-grade debut from young adult author Johnson (Rise to the Sun, 2021) excellently harnesses the anxiety that is prevalent throughout the junior-high years. Ellie's magic serves as a metaphor that carves out a space for uncovering and awakening her identity as a young queer Black girl. Strongly recommended for all collections.
Publishers Weekly Review
Ellie Engle Saves Herself
Publishers Weekly
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Comic book enthusiast Ellie Engle, who is Black, sees herself as the epitome of ordinary, and she's content to dwell in the pressure-free shadow of her outgoing Latina best friend, Abby Ortega. But after an earthquake strikes Plainsboro, Ind., the day the girls start junior high, Ellie realizes she has a crush on Abby, and she also somehow manages to resurrect her own dead pet fish. Slowly, Ellie discovers that she can bring living organisms back to life, for a cost. Ellie, who sometimes experiences panic attacks, doesn't want to cause trouble for her hardworking single mom, and she worries about how the powers of the supers in her comics affect their loved ones. But when popularity-intent Abby pressures Ellie to mask and even reverse her powers, Ellie is reluctant to let them go--even as knowledge of her abilities goes viral, leaving her no choice but to stand on her own two feet. Marrying her customary openhearted style with a necromancy-oriented origin story, Johnson (You Should See Me in a Crown) tackles the pains of growing up--changing bodies, shifting bonds, early crushes, and defining oneself on one's own terms--making for a warmly rendered, lightly speculative love story about a girl learning to believe that she's anything but ordinary. Ages 8--12. Agent: Patrice Caldwell, New Leaf Literary. (May)