Lemons by Melissa Savage

From Goodreads,

"What do you do when you lose everything that means anything?

Ten-year old Lemonade Liberty Witt doesn’t know the answer to that question, except what her mom taught her. When life gives you lemons, you make lemonade. But what if those lemons are so big that you forget how?

How do you make lemonade out of having to leave everything you know in San Francisco to move to the small town of Willow Creek, California and live with a grandfather you’ve never even met? In a town that smells like grass and mud and bugs. With tall pines instead of skyscrapers and dirt instead of sidewalks. Not to mention one woolly beast lurking in the woods.

That’s right, Bigfoot.

A ginormous wooden statue of the ugly thing stands right at the center of town like he’s someone real important, like the mayor or something. And the people here actually believe he’s real and hiding somewhere out in the pine filled forests.

How can anyone possibly be expected to make lemonade out those rotten lemons?

Everything is different and Lem just wants to go back home. And then she meets Tobin Sky, the CEO of Bigfoot Detectives, Inc. and sole investigator for the town. He invites her to be his Assistant for the summer and she reluctantly agrees. At least until she can figure out her escape plan.

Together, Lem and Tobin try to capture a shot of the elusive beast on film and end up finding more than they ever could have even imagined."

Goodreads - Lemons

I have been doing read alouds with my class and after we finished Saving Winslow I let my students pick from a series of books.  Lemons was in the stack along with a couple other notable books.  I gave the students a one sentence summary of the book based on the summary on the back.  The students all voted and we ended up selecting this book to read.  At times the students were fully engaged in this book, at others they were somewhat bored.  It ended up that I finished reading the book for the kids because they really lost interest.

Lemons starts with a young girl named Lemonade, being taken to her grandfather's house who she has never met.  Lemonade just wants to go back home instead of live in a place she's unfamiliar with, with a man she doesn't know.  Soon Lemonade meets a young boy named Tobin who runs the Bigfoot Detectives, Inc.  Lemonade is stubborn and continues to tell Tobin she will be going back home to San Francisco.  But eventually Lemonade settles into life with her grandfather and hanging out with Tobin.  Together they search for bigfoot and along the way they find something even greater.

I absolutely loved this book, but my students were a little mixed about it.  I loved that the story was set back in the 70s, but it also had a still relevant vibe to it.  This story was really big on the connections we have between people and the value of them.  Lemonade and Tobin struggled at times in their friendship.  Lemonade had to learn to trust Tobin and Tobin had to learn how to make Lemonade realize that she belonged in Willow Creek.  Lemonade also had to learn that she needed her grandfather just as much as he needed her.  I absolutely loved the importance that was placed on relationships in this book.  A lot of young adults don't value the relationships they have and they honestly take them for granted.  This book was packed with various examples of relationships with people, and even more importantly the various strains that relationships can have.

One of the downsides of this book is that it was lengthy for a read aloud and it was pretty dull for a large chunk of the book.  I think the lack of excitement was really what put some of my kids off from this book.  About half of them were interested to find out what was living in the woods, the other half was ready to start a new book.  I adored this book as I read it aloud and finished it by myself.  It was a very good wholesome book that had a lot of good things packed in it.

Overall, this book wasn't what I expected, but it was still wonderful.  My students were a little disappointed with the book, but were glad to hear the ending.  I give this 4 out of 5 stars.  This book doesn't really have a specific crowd that I would recommend it to, but it is still really good and is a good fun read.