Review: 'Ode to a Nobody' by Caroline Brooks DuBois

When life is shaky, the last thing you need is a hurricane. Or so you would think. Quinn(ie) is torn between all kinds of things, consistently aware of the ways she is failing all those around her. When a tornado ravages her house it is just one more thing. But perhaps it is also an opportunity. Thanks to Holiday House and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Pub. Date: 12/6/2022
Publisher: Holiday House

A devastating tornado tears apart more than just houses in this striking novel in verse about a girl rebuilding herself.

Before the storm, thirteen-year-old Quinn was happy flying under the radar. She was average. Unremarkable. Always looking for an escape from her house, where her bickering parents fawned over her genius big brother. 
 
     Inside our broken home / we didn’t know how broken / the world outside was.

But after the storm, Quinn can’t seem to go back to average. Her friends weren't affected by the tornado in the same way. To them, the storm left behind a playground of abandoned houses and distracted adults. As Quinn struggles to find stability in the tornado’s aftermath, she must choose: between homes, friendships, and versions of herself.
 
       Nothing that was mine / yesterday is mine today.
 
Told in rich, spectacular verse, Caroline Brooks DuBois crafts a powerful story of redemption as Quinn makes her way from Before to After. There’s nothing average about the world Quinn wakes up to after the storm; maybe there’s nothing average about her, either. This emotional coming-of-age journey for middle grade readers proves that it’s never too late to be the person you want to be.  

In Ode to a Nobody, a stunning Middle-Grade novel-in-verse, Caroline Brooks DuBois explores the story of a girl named Quinn. Except her dad called her Quinnie, so she goes by Quin(nie) to disappoint neither parent and find a middle way. Because Quinn is always failing, especially in comparison with her stellar older brother. But what happens when her everyday is disrupted, violently, by a hurricane and, less violently, by an English teacher's demand for one poem a day for National Poetry Month? Can Quinn return to the everyday disappointment or do these disruptions mark a potential moment of growth? Ode to a Nobody works really well with the quagmire that is teenagehood, with the confusion that comes from being on the cusp of "no longer a child" while still needing so much support. I found myself utterly warmed by some of the beautiful verses in this book and also rather touched by the story Brooks DuBois has crafted.

Ode to a Nobody is, I think, a perfect read for the age-group it focuses on, namely the Middle Grade reader. It deals with difficult topics of family, friendship, lack of control, and changing environments, but does so in a way that is at once true, in that Brooks DuBois doesn't pull her punches, but also educative, without being overbearing. I think this is an incredibly hard balance to strike but Brooks DuBois manages it. I think this is in part due to the format she chose. The novel-in-verse form allows for incredibly creativity, emotion, and pathos in a way "straightforward" prose sometimes doesn't. Whether it is jagged rhyme schemes, odes to a hurricane, or any of the other myriad forms that appear in Ode to a Nobody, Brooks DuBois really uses poetry to its fullest extent to describe Quinn's journey. Even for a "mature" reader like myself, this novel-in-verse has something to offer. This book allowed me to reconnect with a certain part of my childhood, with the insecurity and lack of assurance, but also with the wide-eyed wonder of discovering so many things for the first time, of finding something you're good at for the first time, of truly getting to know yourself for the first time. 

I give this book...

4 Universes!

Ode to a Nobody is a beautiful Middle Grade Novel-in-verse that I would genuinely recommend to any Middle Grade reader but also to the adults around them. It's good to occasionally reconnect with your younger self and Brooks DuBois is a gentle but determined guide!