The Benefits of Being an Octopus

Zoey is a tween, living in a trailer that belongs to her mother's boyfriend, attending school but doing very little work, caring for her young siblings while Zoey's mother and the boyfriend work their low-end jobs. It's an impossible life for all of them, but the trailer and the reliable transportation the boyfriend offers have lifted the small family marginally up, and Zoey's mom struggles to pacify her boyfriend so that the family has a clean place to live and food to eat. Zoey can do little but watch the relationship between her mom and her mom's boyfriend deteriorate as Zoey's mom becomes smaller and smaller to appease her boyfriend.

And then a teacher reaches out to Zoey, and Zoey gradually learns a new way to deal with problems.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS

Slowly, Zoey and her mom begin to take action. The reader is left in the end with the hope that things will get better, but nothing is certain.

I know literally hundreds of students in my town and others across America who would benefit from reading this book, from seeing their lives, possibly for the first time, in a story. It isn't often that I read books with children of poverty as the main characters, and I thank the author for taking on this subject. I also thank the author for not tacking on a happily-ever-after ending; that certainly never seems to happen in real life.

There's a lot to like about this book. It was clever to choose debate as a featured extracurricular. Debate taught Zoey about crafting persuasive (but not fallacious) arguments, and this helped her recognize communication issues in her family. Depicting abuse is always a challenge, perhaps especially when writing for a younger audience. But I think Braden did well. I was especially impressed with how Zoey realizes things are wrong incrementally. She starts off on Lenny's side, seeing (and blaming) her mom as he does. Then she begins to see Lenny differently, but only goes so far as to tell herself that she won't let herself get into a situation like that. Luckily she doesn't stall at this point, instead growing to articulate that nobody but Lenny is responsible for how he treats Zoey and her family. She realizes her mom isn't to blame, and helps her mom see the same thing.I will say, in the end this book presents a pretty reductive and idealistic (though still awful and scary, I want to be clear) version of leaving an abusive relationship, but it's probably unfair to expect something darker and tangled from a middle grade release.Braden also explores disconnects between what kids think and what kids say. Zoey is full of conviction from the moment we met her. She cares a lot and thinks a lot. She shoulders tremendous stress and responsibility. However, for many reasons, Zoey is reluctant to speak up. She struggles to even see herself as worthy of contributing to conversations. Much like [b:Ban This Book 31702735 Ban This Book Alan Gratz https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1491938164s/31702735.jpg 52384448], our protagonist is the oldest sister in a chaotic family in unconvinced of her ability to use her voice to make change. But her perspective is needed and impactful.It's such an empowering and simple message: children have things to say. For our world to be as good as it can be, adults should listen to them.I'd recommend this to fans of the aforementioned [b:Ban This Book 31702735 Ban This Book Alan Gratz https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1491938164s/31702735.jpg 52384448], [b:Ghost 28954126 Ghost (Track, #1) Jason Reynolds https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1468787024s/28954126.jpg 49179183], and Kelly Yang's [b:Front Desk 36127488 Front Desk Kelly Yang https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1507986199s/36127488.jpg 51903030].