Seventh-grader Alex loves space and dreams of working at NASA, fueled by watching rocket launches with his Papi and exploring the NASA website. However, he's stuck in his grade's self-contained classroom doing repetitive, easy work, which prevents him from joining the mainstream science class he needs to pursue his dream. Tired of being told "not yet," Alex is determined to prove to everyone that he's capable of achieving great things.

This is a powerful novel in verse that realistically depicts the challenges Alex faces in school, but also offers hope for triumphs. This is a story that teachers and students should read and discuss. It is a story about advocating, setting, goals, and overcoming obstacles.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for an arc in exchange for this honest review.

I really enjoyed this in verse novel and would recommend it for upper middle grade reluctant readers as it was quick and easy to read. I liked the representation of an ND character, though no specifics were given, many readers will be able to relate to him.

Alex Ramirez has been in a classroom with just a few other students ever since 3rd grade when bullying by his classmates ended with him breaking his former BFF's bone. But he longs to be in the more advanced science with others his age. As he learns to advocate for himself and the others in his class he's brought face to face with his former bullies and must decide how to manage keeping the focus he needs for class, and when to ask for help. This was such a thought provoking read. I appreciated how Alex grew in his ability to communicate his needs, and his advocacy for his friends. And I also loved the way his family learned to support him and share their vulnerabilities too. So good!

I have a soft spot for middle grade novels-in-verse, and this quick read was another great addition to the list. Alex Ramirez is a neurodivergent middle grader in an SC, or self-contained classroom. Like so many children with a disability, he's consistently underestimated by his parents and teachers, and has to advocate for himself in order to get the opportunities he wants.

Alex is a likeable protagonist, and we get a good sense of him as a person throughout the novel. I liked the way we're shown how he works through his issues and refusing to give up on his dream of attending science class with the other seventh-graders. The author doesn't shy away from showing us the difficulties of navigating school as a neurodivergent child, but she shows the possible triumphs as well.

This is a hopeful book that I would definitely recommend. Neurodivergent middle-graders might recognize themselves in these pages, while neurotypical middle-graders get a glimpse into the head of someone whose brain works a little differently from theirs. Alex is a Latinx character, and the story is written in a mix of Spanish and English, so Latinx middle-graders might feel especially represented as well. The Spanish is incorporated well into the text, so middle graders who don't know a lot of Spanish (yet) won't miss out.

Alex’s neurodivergence isn’t clearly specified on the pages, but many readers will deeply resonate with the ways he’s been continually underestimated and infantilized, with people who “celebrate / the regular stuff” and are concerned that standard classes and extracurriculars will be “too much” for him. Alex fights and persists to be heard, even when fellow students disparage him, reminding readers and parents alike that change is possible and worth fighting for. I also love the generational neurodivergence represented in this story.

I personally struggled with the lack of capitalization and punctuation syntactically. It caused confusion at times while reading. Is the implication that this is how Alex writes, and so we are more directly in his voice? I wondered the function of this style. But generally, I enjoyed this story and this rep.

This is a sweet middle grade novel in verse. I loved the representation of a ND main character and the way Alex continued to advocate for himself throughout the book. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC.