The Upside of Ordinary

( 1 )

Overview

Jermaine Davidson wants to be famous—limo-riding, camera-flashing, crowd-cheering famous. She decides to become the first eleven-year-old producer and star of a reality TV show about her life. Her family quickly tires of her following their every move, filming them night and day. But life around the Davidson house is dull, so Jermaine starts staging events to elicit more drama, excitement, and humor. Her unbridled ambition leads her to alienate her best friend over a disastrous make-over episode, send her ...

See more details below
Hardcover
$16.00
BN.com price
(Save 5%)$16.95 List Price
Pick Up In Store

Pick Up In Store

Reserve and pick up in 60 minutes at your local store

Other sellers (Hardcover)
  • All (25) from $1.99   
  • New (15) from $9.59   
  • Used (10) from $1.99   
Note: Kids' Club Eligible. See More Details.
Sending request ...

More About This Book

Overview

Jermaine Davidson wants to be famous—limo-riding, camera-flashing, crowd-cheering famous. She decides to become the first eleven-year-old producer and star of a reality TV show about her life. Her family quickly tires of her following their every move, filming them night and day. But life around the Davidson house is dull, so Jermaine starts staging events to elicit more drama, excitement, and humor. Her unbridled ambition leads her to alienate her best friend over a disastrous make-over episode, send her arachnophobic mother packing, turn an emotional family crisis into a tacky mystery segment, and ruin her mother's chances to win the annual pickle palooza. Filled with remorse, Jermaine turns her talents to making amends and in the process learns the upside of being part of a loving but ordinary family.

Read More Show Less

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly
Jermaine is determined to be famous, but her Maine town is so far from Hollywood that movie stardom isn't likely, nor is becoming a supermodel ("Let's face it, how many supermodels can you think of that have frizzy brown hair and a palate extender?"). So the 11-year-old opts to create a reality TV show based on her family. Yet after filming her mother cleaning a chicken, her father plunging a toilet, and her sister burning microwave popcorn, Jermaine decides her family is too ordinary for TV. Her solution? She'll orchestrate the drama. In amusing, ill-fated scenarios, Jermaine botches a friend's haircut while filming a makeover and sends her arachnophobic mother screeching out of the house by setting loose a tarantula. In an easygoing story about following one's dreams and appreciating what one has, debut novelist Lubner (whose picture books include A Horse's Tale: A Colonial Williamsburg Adventure) balances well-staged comedy with Jermaine's thoughtful musings on her family's eccentricities, which lead her to recognize that "ordinary" is relative. Ages 8–12. (Sept.)
Children's Literature - Lisa Colozza Cocca
Eleven-year-old Jermaine is determined to be famous. She decides the fastest route to fame would be a reality television show about her family. She picks up her video camera and starts taping her mother, who is also the local pickle queen, her father, and her older sister, Zelda. She soon decides their lives are just too ordinary to make for interesting television. Instead of giving up on producing the reality series, she decides to start staging some events to catch how her friends and family react. The humor is a bit one note and wears on the reader. Many of her staged problems seem more sneaky and mean spirited than funny. For example, when her friends want to be in the reality show, Jermaine invites them over for a braiding party. Meanwhile, she makes secret plans with Zelda to cut and color their hair. Jermaine films the disaster as it happens; including her friend's sobbing response. Although she sometimes mentions a bad feeling in her stomach after she sets up a situation, she doesn't regret enough to avoid repeating the behavior. A subplot in the book revolves around Jermaine's Uncle Harry. Harry uses the money his family has saved for a new van for their business to invest in a new invention. When the invention fails, the money is lost. Instead of talking to his wife about it, Harry runs away for a while to avoid facing the consequences. While his wife and daughter worry about him, Jermaine thinks about how she can film the reunion when he returns. When Jermaine creates one last disaster at the Pickle Palooza, she finally realizes people are more important than fame and hangs up her camera. This is a fast and easy read on a topical subject—reality television—with a not very likeable main character. Reviewer: Lisa Colozza Cocca
School Library Journal
Gr 4–6—There is not much out of the ordinary in Bangor, Maine, where 11-year-old Jermaine lives with her pickle-making mom, cranky big sister Zelda, and just plain dad. She wants to be famous, like paparazzi-stalked, red-carpet, flashbulbs famous. Using her family and friends as her reality-show fodder, she hopes to capture the attention of famous TV producer Rufus Carmichael. She writes to him throughout the book, explaining how she tries to instigate more drama and excitement from those around her. During the course of the action, she does succeed in scaring her mother out of the house, making a tough situation with her uncle worse, and messing up a whole batch of her mother's pickles. In the end, she realizes her mistakes, finds a good way to use her camera, and does become a little bit famous via her mom, the pickle lady of Maine. The premise for this book is current, but the pacing of the story is very slow, and many of the child's efforts seem boring or outright mean. Even though this novel is an easy read, it will not have wide appeal.—Nancy Jo Lambert, Ruth Borchardt Elementary, Plano, TX
Kirkus Reviews
Jermaine is old enough to know better. She has a video camera, and she's decided that it will carve her path to fame. She plans to tape all the foibles of her typical middle-class family. She quickly realizes that those ups and downs of family life aren't sufficiently compelling, so she stages more exciting situations. She deliberately upsets a pitcher of ice water that lands in her mother's lap one winter evening, a freezing cold mess. She bribes her older sister to give her best friend a "makeover"--with pinking shears and Scare-Hair--leading to another highly photogenic calamity. Next she brings home the class pet, a tarantula, and turns it loose in the presence of her spider-phobic mother. Eleven-year-old Jermaine regrets these manufactured mishaps, but not enough to keep her from staging another in the quest for the television fame that surely awaits her. Jermaine's pie-in-the-face comedy teeters on the brink of mean-spiritedness, saved only by her eventual, albeit late, recognition of the pain she's inflicted. Surrounded by a cast of nearly normal folks, lightly sketched but believably depicted, and narrating in the present tense, Jermaine neatly captures her living-in-the-moment, no-holds-barred attitude. This debut novel offers an amusing lesson on the downside of reality television, one that readers will catch on to far sooner than the misguided protagonist. (Fiction. 9-12)
Read More Show Less

Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780823424177
  • Publisher: Holiday House, Inc.
  • Publication date: 9/1/2012
  • Pages: 128
  • Sales rank: 917,912
  • Age range: 8 - 12 Years
  • Lexile: 670L (what's this?)
  • Product dimensions: 5.60 (w) x 8.30 (h) x 0.80 (d)

Meet the Author

Susan Lubner has written three picture books, including Noises at Night, which was named a 2006 Today Show Best Pick for Young Children. This is her first novel. She lives in Southborough, Massachusetts.

Read More Show Less

Customer Reviews

Average Rating 5
( 1 )
Rating Distribution

5 Star

(1)

4 Star

(0)

3 Star

(0)

2 Star

(0)

1 Star

(0)

Your Rating:

Review Guidelines
Add Recommendations
Your Name: Create a Pen Name or

Barnes & Noble.com Review Rules

Our reader reviews allow you to share your comments on titles you liked, or didn't, with others. By submitting an online review, you are representing to Barnes & Noble.com that all information contained in your review is original and accurate in all respects, and that the submission of such content by you and the posting of such content by Barnes & Noble.com does not and will not violate the rights of any third party. Please follow the rules below to help ensure that your review can be posted.

Reviews by Our Customers Under the Age of 13

We highly value and respect everyone's opinion concerning the titles we offer. However, we cannot allow persons under the age of 13 to have accounts at BN.com or to post customer reviews. Please see our Terms of Use for more details.

What to exclude from your review:

Please do not write about reviews, commentary, or information posted on the product page. If you see any errors in the information on the product page, please send us an email.

Reviews should not contain any of the following:

  • - HTML tags, profanity, obscenities, vulgarities, or comments that defame anyone
  • - Time-sensitive information such as tour dates, signings, lectures, etc.
  • - Single-word reviews. Other people will read your review to discover why you liked or didn't like the title. Be descriptive.
  • - Comments focusing on the author or that may ruin the ending for others
  • - Phone numbers, addresses, URLs
  • - Pricing and availability information or alternative ordering information
  • - Advertisements or commercial solicitation

Reminder:

  • - By submitting a review, you grant to Barnes & Noble.com and its sublicensees the royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable right and license to use the review in accordance with the Barnes & Noble.com Terms of Use.
  • - Barnes & Noble.com reserves the right not to post any review -- particularly those that do not follow the terms and conditions of these Rules. Barnes & Noble.com also reserves the right to remove any review at any time without notice.
  • - See Terms of Use for other conditions and disclaimers.
Search for Products You'd Like to Recommend

Recommend other products that relate to your review. Just search for them below and share!

Create a Pen Name

Your Pen Name is your unique identity on BN.com. It will appear on the reviews you write and other website activities. Your Pen Name cannot be edited, changed or deleted once submitted.

 
Your Pen Name can be any combination of alphanumeric characters (plus - and _), and must be at least two characters long.

Continue Anonymously
Sort by: Showing 1 Customer Review

  • Posted January 4, 2013

    more from this reviewer

    Jermaine Davidson, eleven years old, is like so many kids today

    Jermaine Davidson, eleven years old, is like so many kids today who want to be superstars.  What originally starts out as a "reality show" turns into chaos.  It seems that Jermaine thinks her family is boring.  It is this thought process that leads her to stage many scenes for her "show".  These are the beginnings of catastrophes.  Jermaine is typical of many middle schoolers who think only of themselves.  I say this as a middle school teacher.  They don't always think things through first.  This is a great, or off limits.  I heard the voices of many of my students in my head commenting, "if that was my sister she'd be in so much trouble." This is an extremely believable and humorous book.  I loved the decision Jermaine finally makes.  What?  You don't know what I'm talking about?  Then you really must read the book.  I can't wait to do a book talk and recommend it to my students and  our media specialist.

    Was this review helpful? Yes  NoThank you for your feedback.   Report this reviewThank you, this review has been flagged.
Sort by: Showing 1 Customer Review
If you find inappropriate content, please report it to Barnes & Noble
Why is this product inappropriate?
Comments (optional)