Review: Moo by Sharon Creech

Title: Moo

Author: Sharon Creech 

Publisher: HarperCollins

Publishing Date: August 30th, 2016

Pages: 288
Audio Length: 2 Hours and 20 Minutes

Genre: Middle Grade Contemporary 

Series: Standalone

Source: Audio

 

Fans of Newbery Medal winner Sharon Creech’s Love That Dog and Hate That Cat will love her newest tween novel, Moo. This uplifting tale reminds us that if we’re open to new experiences, life is full of surprises. Following one family’s momentous move from the city to rural Maine, an unexpected bond develops between twelve-year-old Reena and one very ornery cow.
When Reena, her little brother, Luke, and their parents first move to Maine, Reena doesn’t know what to expect. She’s ready for beaches, blueberries, and all the lobster she can eat. Instead, her parents “volunteer” Reena and Luke to work for an eccentric neighbor named Mrs. Falala, who has a pig named Paulie, a cat named China, a snake named Edna—and that stubborn cow, Zora.
This heartwarming story, told in a blend of poetry and prose, reveals the bonds that emerge when we let others into our lives.

What made me pick this book up: 

I think it was one that we got as an ARC, and it looked super cute. I thought "I want to read a book called Moo" And the cover is super cute.

What did I like about the cover: 

It has a cow. I love cows. Any time I see a cow in real life I still yell out "Cow!" and I love how simple the cover is. It's just a cow.

What made me read this book: 

I wanted to review it, plus it's a cow. The book sounded really cute and I needed a feel good contemporary book and this one was perfect.

What did I like the most: 

The whole story is absolutely adorable. 

12 year old Reena just moved from a big city to a small town in Maine. When she gets to Maine she realizes how much her life is going to change, and how little she actually knows about living in a small city.

After they move her parents volunteer Reena and her little brother Luke to work with a crazy old lady named Mrs. Falala. Mrs. Falala's farm has all kinds of animals, from a snake, to a pig, to a cat, to a stubborn old cow. 

Reena and her brother don't like Mrs. Falala at first, and neither of them know how to work on a farm. But they soon learn and learn to love not only the farm, but Mrs. Falala too.

It's a very light and loving story about a girl from a big city who learns to love working and loves a stubborn old cow named Zola. 

The writing is done really well. It's really simple, but it really packs a punch with the way it's written. It's full of humor and it really teaches a lesson about hard work and learning to love what you're given. Even when you think you never will.

The characters are well written. Reena is kind of whiny at first, but she's 12.

Her brother, Luke, is a sweet and kind of weird child. He hates being touched and he loves to draw. While working on the farm he teaches Mrs. Falala how to draw. 

Mrs. Falala is rude, honest, and incredibly blunt. She's eccentric and kind of crazy. But you can't help but love her. 

And then there's Zola. For being a cow with no words, she certainly has a big personality. 

This book had me giggling and crying and giggling. 

The best part is I listened to it on audio, and hearing the narrator "moo" was fantastic. I kept mooing out loud every time she did, much to my husband's dismay. 

What didn't I like: 

There is a very very sad part. It broke my heart just a little bit.

But otherwise that, there wasn't much I didn't like to be honest.

Would I read the rest of the series/more from this author?
Oh yes

This was a really cute and simple read with a great story.

I was born in South Euclid, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland, and grew up there with my noisy and rowdy family: my parents (Ann and Arvel), my sister (Sandy), and my three brothers (Dennis, Doug and Tom).
For a fictional view of what it was like growing up in my family, see Absolutely Normal Chaos. (In that book, the brothers even have the same names as my own brothers.) Our house was not only full of us Creeches, but also full of friends and visiting relatives.
In the summer, we usually took a trip, all of us piled in a car and heading out to Wisconsin or Michigan or, once, to Idaho. We must have been a very noisy bunch, and I'm not sure how our parents put up with being cooped up with us in the car for those trips. The five-day trip out to Idaho when I was twelve had a powerful effect on me: what a huge and amazing country! I had no idea then that thirty-some years later, I would recreate that trip in a book called Walk Two Moons.
One other place we often visited was Quincy, Kentucky, where my cousins lived (and still live) on a beautiful farm, with hills and trees and swimming hole and barn and hayloft. We were outside running in those hills all day long, and at night we'd gather on the porch where more stories would be told. I loved Quincy so much that it has found its way into many of my books--transformed into Bybanks, Kentucky. Bybanks appears in Walk Two Moons and Chasing Redbird and Bloomability. Bybanks also makes a brief appearance (by reference, but not by name) in The Wanderer.
When I was young, I wanted to be many things when I grew up: a painter, an ice skater, a singer, a teacher, and a reporter. It soon became apparent that I had little drawing talent, very limited tolerance for falling on ice, and absolutely no ability to stay on key while singing. I also soon learned that I would make a terrible reporter because when I didn't like the facts, I changed them. It was in college, when I took literature and writing courses, that I became intrigued by story-telling. Later, I was a teacher (high school English and writing) in England and in Switzerland. While teaching great literature, I learned so much about writing: about what makes a story interesting and about techniques of plot and characterization and point of view. I started out writing novels for adults: The Recital and Nickel Malley were both written and published while I was living in England (these books were published in England only and are now out of print.) But the next book was Absolutely Normal Chaos, and ever since that book I have written mainly about young people. Walk Two Moons was the first of my books to be published in America. When it received the Newbery Medal, no one was more surprised than I was. I'm still a little bit in shock.
After Walk Two Moons came Chasing Redbird, Pleasing the Ghost, Bloomability, The Wanderer, and Fishing in the Air. I hope to be writing stories for a long, long time.
I am married to Lyle Rigg, who is the headmaster of The Pennington School in Pennington, New Jersey, and have two grown children, Rob and Karin. Being with my family is what I enjoy most. The next-best thing is writing stories.

© Sharon Creech