The main character Halley, is a 9-year-old girl, named after Halley’s Comet. She loves science and is often doing secret experiments, much to her mother’s dismay who really seems to like a very neat and tidy house. Her experiments tend to get on the very messy side (note, never put oobleck down the sink).
Halley is on the verge of being banned from doing science at home, and her mom doesn’t seem to appreciate her curious mind, calling her a square peg in a round hole. Halley’s mom agrees to send her and her best friend Gracelyn to science camp.
She doesn’t seem to have the best start to camp, being the only 2 female campers, and have a run-in with a group of boys in the beginning, and they play some great pranks on the boys, or at least try to. There are a bunch of team challenges and there is a mystery to solve along the way, with a bunch of “accidents” that befall the campers. So Halley and the team have to use the scientific principals they knew and have learned to solve the mystery.
Her dad calls her “Miss Disaster” and is overall rather supportive of her and her learning style, even going so far as building her a treehouse lab. I did personally find it interesting that the dad didn’t defend Halley as much as I think he should have, in her pursuit of knowledge.
I think this is a good story about how to find oneself and be happy in your own skin.
The story emphasizes Newton’s laws of motion and has some fun and detailed experiments that kids can try at home.
Find Halley Harper, Science Girl Extraordinaire: Summer Set in Motion on Amazon at https://www.amazon.com/dp/1732528500.
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