Dear Mr. Henshaw

I just finished "Dear Mr. Henshaw" by Beverly Cleary in approximately 3 hours. The story begins with the main character, a boy named Leigh, writing a letter to his favorite author. Leigh starts out as an immature boy and we see his development throughout the story through his letters. He has a hard time making friends at his new school, his parents are divorced and someone keeps stealing all the best items from his lunches!

At first he deals with all of this by being down and self focused all the time.We see through his letters how he begins to work through his problems and he even begins writing on his own for Young Writers Month at his school. It's interesting to see his transformation, and enjoyable since I myself have experienced so much transformation through reading and writing.I thought it was fun to think back on elementary school and the time of the year when we all had to write our own short stories. I always loved that!

Overall, I think this book may have won because it's a great look at the impact that most authors hope to have when they write. It was simple, but I'm glad I read it.