About This Book
How did a day-dreamy girl, who loved to read and draw, end up getting born into a messy, restless family with FIVE little brothers? That's what 12-year-old Carmen Cathcart wanted to know. Somewhere up in heaven before she was born, she must have gotten on the wrong bus! Now her family was moving yet AGAIN and Carmen was going to have to start junior high in a new town: Independence, Missouri. Will she at least make a best friend, finally? AND, as if Carmen didn't have enough worries, her mom was pregnant again! How, with another bawly baby to help take care of, can Carmen possibly hold on to her dream of being a great artist one day? Could things get any worse? In the year between May 1963 and May 1964, Carmen Cathcart must learn how to hold onto her dreams while having to hold her family together. Her story is set against America's civil rights movement and the tragedy of John F. Kennedy's assassination. And, after a devastating blow to the Cathcart household, in the moment of Carmen's deepest despair, she is comforted by a stranger when a former President makes a surprise cameo appearance. It isn't as if a crabby big sister learns to love her big, bizwang family – the love was always there. Carmen Cathcart comes to a more important realization: she likes them.
