Cilla Lee-Jenkins: Future Author Extraordinaire

by Susan Tan, Dana Wulfekotte (Illustrator)

Overview

Cilla Lee-Jenkins is 50% Chinese, 50% Caucasian, and 100% destined for literary greatness! In this middle grade novel, she shares stories about a new sibling, being biracial, and her destiny as a future author extraordinaire.

“Heartwarming and poignant! Meeting Cilla felt like making a new best friend.” —Grace Lin, bestselling author of Newbery Honor book Where the Mountain Meets the Moon and National Book Award finalist When the Sea Turned to Silver

Priscilla "Cilla" Lee-Jenkins is on a tight deadline. Her baby sister is about to be born, and Cilla needs to become a bestselling author before her family forgets all about her. So she writes about what she knows best—herself! And Cilla has a lot to write about: How did she deal with being bald until the age of five? How did she overcome her struggles with reading? How do family traditions with Grandma and Granpa Jenkins differ from family traditions with her Chinese grandparents, Nai Nai and Ye Ye?

Written by Susan Tan and illustrated by Dana Wolfekotte, Cilla Lee-Jenkins: Future Author Extraordinaire is a novel bursting with love and humor, as told through a bright, irresistible biracial protagonist who will win your heart and make you laugh.

Don't miss the sequel!

Cilla Lee-Jenkins: This Book Is a Classic

Praise for Cilla-Lee Jenkins: Future Author Extraordinaire:

"This story has everything. An irresistible voice, a cast of authentic characters, a hilarious and whip-smart heroine. Also . . . some spectacular baldness and TIME TRAVEL! Cilla Lee-Jenkins is brilliant. Her struggles may seem ordinary, but they’re also extraordinary, exquisite, and very very important." —Kate Beasley, author of Gertie's Leap to Greatness

“Cilla’s empathy, candor, and skill at turning a phrase indicates that her claim to be a future author extraordinaire is completely justified . . . Anyone who spends time with Cilla Lee-Jenkins will look forward to reading her in the future.” —Booklist, starred review

“[Cilla Lee-Jenkins] is 50% Chinese, 50% Caucasian and I think 100% wonderful . . . I suspect young readers will want to reach into the pages and hug her!” —Rachel Renee Russell, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Dork Diaries, for Omnivoracious.com

“Cilla Lee-Jenkins is the kind of book you can’t wait to share. There’s humor and heartache, and future writers of all kinds will see themselves in Cilla. But above all, this is a book just bursting with love.” —Kate Milford, New York Times bestselling author of Greenglass House

“I challenge anyone to read this book and not fall in love with Cilla Lee-Jenkins. With the spunk of Ivy and Bean and the heart of Ramona Quimby, she’s a charmer from start to finish of this laugh-out-loud-funny book.” —I. W. Gregorio, author of None of the Above

“Cilla’s liveliness, vulnerability, and thoughtfulness make her an endearing and entertaining narrator.” —Horn Book

“Tan, who grew up in a mixed-race family, does a lovely job of showing how Cilla finds joy in both sides of her heritage.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Tan writes in a fun and spunky voice that brings to mind favorite characters such as Junie B. Jones, Ramona Quimby, and Fancy Nancy but is still all her own . . . Readers will identify with Cilla and wish they were friends with her in real life.” —School Library Journal

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781250144003
Publisher:	Square Fish
Publication date:	03/27/2018
Series:	Cilla Lee-Jenkins Series , #1
Pages:	272
Product dimensions:	5.10(w) x 7.00(h) x 0.50(d)
Lexile:	940L (what's this?)
Age Range:	8 - 12 Years

About the Author

Susan Tan is the author of the Asian Pacific American Librarian Association Literature Award–winning Cilla Lee-Jenkins series and the Pets Rule! early reader series. She currently lives in Somerville, Massachusetts, and is an assistant professor at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. This means she gets to talk about books all the time—both with readers like you and with her adult students—which is basically her childhood dream.

Dana Wulfekotte is a children’s book author, illustrator, and animator. She graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and lives in Queens with her boyfriend and two rabbits (whom she now regrets not naming Supernova and Sparkledust). She is the illustrator of the Cilla Lee-Jenkins books, The Remember Balloons, and her own authored Rabbit & Possum.

Editorial Reviews

Praise for Cilla Lee-Jenkins: Future Author Extraordinaire:

"This story has everything. An irresistible voice, a cast of authentic characters, a hilarious and whip-smart heroine. Also . . . some spectacular baldness and TIME TRAVEL! Cilla Lee-Jenkins is brilliant. Her struggles may seem ordinary, but they’re also extraordinary, exquisite, and very very important." —Kate Beasley, author of Gertie's Leap to Greatness

“Cilla’s empathy, candor, and skill at turning a phrase indicates that her claim to be a future author extraordinaire is completely justified . . . Anyone who spends time with Cilla Lee-Jenkins will look forward to reading her in the future.” —Booklist, starred review

“[Cilla Lee-Jenkins] is 50% Chinese, 50% Caucasian and I think 100% wonderful . . . I suspect young readers will want to reach into the pages and hug her!” —Rachel Renee Russell, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Dork Diaries, for Omnivoracious.com

“Cilla Lee-Jenkins is the kind of book you can’t wait to share. There’s humor and heartache, and future writers of all kinds will see themselves in Cilla. But above all, this is a book just bursting with love.” —Kate Milford, New York Times bestselling author of Greenglass House

“I challenge anyone to read this book and not fall in love with Cilla Lee-Jenkins. With the spunk of Ivy and Bean and the heart of Ramona Quimby, she’s a charmer from start to finish of this laugh-out-loud-funny book.” —I. W. Gregorio, author of None of the Above

“Cilla’s liveliness, vulnerability, and thoughtfulness make her an endearing and entertaining narrator.” —Horn Book

“Tan, who grew up in a mixed-race family, does a lovely job of showing how Cilla finds joy in both sides of her heritage.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Tan writes in a fun and spunky voice that brings to mind favorite characters such as Junie B. Jones, Ramona Quimby, and Fancy Nancy but is still all her own . . . Readers will identify with Cilla and wish they were friends with her in real life.” —School Library Journal

From the Publisher

2016-12-21
An aspiring author grapples with change in her family. Cilla Lee-Jenkins, age 8 ½ and in second grade, has a set of white grandparents, the Jenkinses, whom she sees on Thursdays when her parents work late, and a set of Chinese-American grandparents, the Lees, whom she sees on Wednesdays when her parents go out to eat. Her mom's expecting a baby Cilla calls The Blob. Cilla plans to be an author, and this debut novel purports to be her journal, in which she describes not only what is happening to her now—dreading the new baby and unhappy that the two sets of grandparents don't get along—but tells several stories from her younger days in preschool and kindergarten. This creates a problem. While Cilla's voice is clever, her stories, attitude, and problems are all those of a far younger child than one who could write such a sophisticated account. The heart of the story—Cilla's disappointment that her sister's birth unites the family in ways hers did not—is glossed over, and while Cilla's unhappiness about the new baby feels unrealistically extreme, so too does the speed with which it disappears. Tan, who grew up in a mixed-race family, does a lovely job of showing how Cilla finds joy in both sides of her heritage. Wulfekotte's soft, black-and-white illustrations appear every few pages. In the end, this book is too difficult for most of the 7-year-old readers who would like Cilla and features too young a protagonist to interest 10-year-olds ready for books of this length. (Fiction. 7-10)

Kirkus Reviews