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Savvy | 
| Author: Ingrid Law
Publisher: Dial
Category: Book
List Price: $16.99
Buy New: $5.79
You Save: $11.20 (66%)
New (35) Used (13) from $3.05
Avg. Customer Rating:  15 reviews
Sales Rank: 18787
Media: Hardcover
Edition: Reprint
Reading Level: Ages 9-12
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 352
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.8
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.7 x 1.3
ISBN: 0803733062
EAN: 9780803733060
ASIN: 0803733062
Publication Date: May 1, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: Expedited shipping available
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: BRAND NEW COPY, NO UGLY REMAINDER MARKS.
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Product Description
A vibrant new voice . . . a modern classic. For generations, the Beaumont family has harbored a magical secret. They each possess a savvya special supernatural power that strikes when they turn thirteen. Grandpa Bomba moves mountains, her older brothers create hurricanes and spark electricity . . . and now its the eve of Mibss big day. As if waiting werent hard enough, the family gets scary news two days before Mibss birthday: Poppa has been in a terrible accident. Mibs develops the singular mission to get to the hospital and prove that her new power can save her dad. So she sneaks onto a salesmans bus . . . only to find the bus heading in the opposite direction. Suddenly Mibs finds herself on an unforgettable odyssey that will force her to make sense of growing upand of other people, who might also have a few secrets hidden just beneath the skin.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 10 more reviews...
 A fine story of latent powers and survival October 12, 2008
Mibs Beaumont is about to become a teen - and thirteen is when a Beaumont's latent powers typically come into play. But the day before her birthday her father is in a terrible accident - and all she wishes for is to gain a power that will help him survive. A fine story of latent powers and survival evolves.
Courtesy of Teens Read Too September 25, 2008
This was a really fun book to read.
Mississippi, aka Mibs, and her family each get a magical gift, called a savvy, on their thirteenth birthday. Rocket, Mibs's brother, has the savvy of being able to control electricity. He is a lot like those comic book heroes, good-looking with electric sparks coming off of his hands. At thirteen, her other brother, Fish, found out that he can control weather, especially causing water storms. So at thirteen the kids become homeschooled and have to learn how to control their special abilities.
When the story opens, Mibs is two days away from turning thirteen herself. She is excited about her special birthday when her father is in a horrible twelve-car accident on the highway. He ends up in a coma in a hospital in Salina, Kansas.
When she gets her savvy, she is being taken care of by the minister's wife and all she can think of is how to get to her Poppa. Mibs, Fish, her little brother, Samson, and two of the minister's kids run away to find Poppa. SAVVY is the story of their adventures crossing Nebraska and Kansas, trying to control savvys, which is called scumbling, learning to see the good in people, and, of course, the courage it takes to act on your ideals and love.
I loved the writing in this book. The author uses a lot of figurative language. Besides metaphor and simile, Ingrid Law also uses a lot of alliteration in the telling of the story. Phrases such as pushing-pulling waves, itch and scritch of birthday buzz, or how about a gaggle of flat-footed goslings. It was remarkable how the author could use language to make this story even better than it already was.
So if you want to read a really good story about growing up or if you just love the sound of language, then this is the book for you. Have a really rad read!
Reviewed by: Marta Morrison
 *yawn* August 7, 2008
1 out of 6 found this review helpful
Ugh.
It has taken me days to try and sort out what bothers me about this book. I think it's the mixture pseudo-magical realism and corn-pone storytelling. The narrator won't shut up, isn't very bright (none of the kids in this story are), and is the mouthpiece for the author's ham-fisted "everybody is special in heir own way" message.
On their thirteenth birthdays the Beaumont's receive their "savvy," that special something they possess that no one else does. For Mibs, on the eve of her thirteenth birthday, the question is what form will her savvy take. Will it be the the quiet kind, like her mother's ability to do everything perfectly, or like her grandmother's ability to capture radio waves in mason jars like lightning bugs? Or will it be like her brother's, one who can harness electricity and another who creates hurricanes whenever he's near a large body of water?
Sadly, Mibs birthday plans are interrupted when the author decides to drop an obstacle in Mibs path: her father is involved in an accident on the highway and is laid up in a hospital to the south. Convinced by the lamest of evidence that her savvy involves "waking" objects previously believed to be permanently inert, Mibs in convinced she can bring her daddy out of his coma. But how to get to the hospital when she's been left behind by her mother?
That's right, stow away in the back of a traveling bible salesman's bus. And while you're at it, why not make it you and two of your sibling. And a couple of preacher's kids. Got it? That's five kids who think it's a good idea to stow away on a stranger's bus. The fact that he's a bible salesman is supposed to make you feel safe about it all.
Once they discover they're headed the wrong direction they prevail upon said salesman to deliver them where they need to go. He agrees that he can take them there eventually, but has his stops to make first.
Yeah, I've got a vehicle full of stowaways and I think I'll just drive around with them for a bit while they sort things out among themselves. No one's going to ask me down the road what the hell I was thinking, driving them around for days without anyone knowing...
Oh, and Mibs gets her savvy. And I have to ask: is this a metaphor for getting your period, or having ritual circumcision, or a bar mitzvah? Anyway, she gets it. Her savvy is being to hear what people are thinking but only through whatever ink happens to be on their skin. Even a temporary tattoo is able to speak to Mibs who figures this out several chapters after the read has and is falling asleep.
I'm sorry, I can't seem to give a straight summary here.
Here's where you first lose me: The character's name is Mississippi but her younger sibling can't pronounce that and calls her Mibs. Okay. But that's what everyone calls her? She lets teachers and strangers and friends and enemies call her by her family name? No, I don't think so.
Next wrong fork in the road: stowing away on a stranger's bus to get someplace. Uh huh. You don't admit knowing it's wrong, then try to lay a claim that you believe the driver to be safe, all the while exhibiting a failure to understand your own critical facilities. A history of bad judgment in a character shouldn't allow for safety to prevail at its most crucial point. Kids get into trouble all the time thinking they know enough to stay safe, make bad decisions, and trust people they shouldn't as a result. Here we have not one but FIVE kids who all fail to do the right thing, believing there's safety in numbers while they are on a bus headed in the wrong direction with no one knowing where they are.
Yeah, yeah, don't give me that stuff about the news bulletin on the TV throughout and the police looking for them. That's all after the fact (and worse, it is there to tie up a loose end concerning he paternity of one of the kids!). The fact is dumb kids + dumb decisions should not = positive results. We don't live in that world, and even if we lived in a world full of people with secret "savvies" it would strain credulity to believe that these are the actions of smart, savvy people.
Lastly (for now), if you want a main character to spout the curious homilies and expressions of a Southern Carl Sandburg at least make them sound like they're coming from a kid and not an old lady. Kids will incorporate the language they learn and know, but not with such abundance and variety as they do here. Yes I get that it supposed to take on the feel of a tall tale, all that language-of-the-people stuff, but it feels as wrong as shoulder pads on a t-shirt; it's a statement, but is that really the statement you want to make?
In a bit of backward glancing at all the people who loved this book, and all of those that didn't, I'm starting to get a sense that this book could be a new litmus test for determining whose judgment I can trust. I think there are a lot of people out there, many of them librarians, who would consider this prime Newbery material. Sadly. Probably the same ones who agreed with the Newbery committee over The Higher Power of Lucky. Savvy nabbed a Boston Globe/Horn Book Honor recently. Let's hope it stops there.
A wonderful, entertaining novel August 5, 2008
Mississippi Beaumont, or Mibs as she prefers, seems to have a typical family. She lives with a mother and a father, a grandfather, two older brothers, one younger brother and a baby sister somewhere in between Kansas and Nebraska. But that's about as close to ordinary as they get.
A "savvy" is an extraordinary, unique, out-of-this-world, unbelievable talent that goes beyond a person's wildest imagination --- almost like a superpower. Receiving a savvy on one's 13th birthday is something that runs in Mibs's family. Her mom has one, as does her grandfather and almost all of her ancestors on her mom's side. Her two older brothers, Rocket and Fish, are still learning how to control their savvy. Rocket conducts his own electricity, and when he gets upset, light bulbs burst, stoplights crack, and other unfortunate and hard-to-explain events occur. Fish controls the weather --- or, rather, he's learning to control it. When he gets riled up, storms brew with wild wind and pounding rain. He caused a hurricane on his 13th birthday, thus the family now lives as far away as possible from large lakes and oceans.
The day before Mibs's birthday, her dad is involved in a horrible car accident and is in a coma at the hospital. Immediately, her mom and Rocket drive over to be with him. The preacher's wife hears the news and quickly comes to help care for the rest of the Beaumont family, much to their annoyance. Mibs isn't very fond of the preacher's wife or their kids, including 16-year-old gum-chewing Bobbi and her 14-year-old brother, Will Junior. And to make matters worse, the preacher's wife wants to cheer everyone up by throwing Mibs a huge party. A public party on a Beaumont's 13th birthday is a disaster waiting to happen.
Mibs wakes up on her big day mixed with nervous excitement for her savvy to arrive and desperate worry for her sick father. She convinces herself that her new savvy will somehow be able to help her dad get better, if only she can get to the hospital. Later that day, at the church for her impromptu party, she sees her chance. She sneaks aboard a pink bus belonging to the traveling Bible salesman, knowing the vehicle will be returning to the city where her father is. Fish and Samson also clamber on board, along with Bobbi and Will Junior. The stowaways have no idea of the magnitude of the journey they are about to embark on, the excitement they will encounter, the friendships they will form, or the enlightenment they will experience. And no one, not even Mibs herself, could imagine how special her incredible savvy will be.
SAVVY is Ingrid Law's first novel, and her own writing talents have burst out shining bright and clear. Not only is this story fun, hilarious, relatable and enduring, Law manages to cleverly sneak in words of award-winning wisdom that will help any person find some happiness within himself or herself, no matter what age. Her writing style and voice speak volumes through each of her unique characters, especially Mibs: "Maybe it's like that for everyone, I thought. Maybe we all have other people's voices running higgledy-piggledy through our heads all the time. I thought how often my poppa and momma were there inside my head with me, telling me right from wrong. Or how the voices of Ashley Bing and Emma Flint sometimes got stuck under my skin, taunting me and making me feel low, even when they weren't around. I began to realize how hard it was to separate out all the voices to hear the single, strong one that came just from me."
This is a wonderful, entertaining novel, and readers will be waiting impatiently for Ingrid Law's next special gift of storytelling.
--- Reviewed by Chris Shanley-Dillman, author of FINDING MY LIGHT and THE BLACK POND
Impressive debut, great fun. August 1, 2008
Mississippi Beaumont's family members always turn thirteen with a bang. That's when their unpredictable (and usually uncontrollable) "savvy" kicks in. One brother makes electricity, another makes hurricanes. But on the day before Mibs's thirteenth birthday, when Mibs' Poppa is injured in a serious car crash, Mibs' impending savvy is all but forgotten. It's going to take more than a savvy superpower to get to Poppa's hospital in Salina, Kansas, 90 miles away, but with the help of windstorms, talking tattoos, a pink bible-selling bus driver, a first crush, and a vanishing seven-year old, they may just make it. Strongly recommended for middle-grade readers and fans of warm-hearted youth fiction.
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