Calli Be Gold

By Michele Weber Hurwitz

for readers 9 and up     Realistic Fiction     198 pages

Calli Gold might have been born into the wrong family.  In her eleven years she has discovered that “you can divide all the people in the world into two categories:  The loud ones who shout about who they are and what they do, and the quiet ones who just are and do.”  She supposes that all evens out “Except for this:  if you’re a quiet person randomly and hopelessly born into a family of louds….”  That’s where Calli finds herself the quiet one who notices much but says little.

While her family pushes her to discover the passion she can take to a championship level, Calli struggles to find hidden gift.  She knows that she has failed at everything she’s tried so far.  Perhaps she just isn’t a Gold.  Then Calli meets Noah Zullo, a second grader who seems strange to everyone else.  Calli likes him.  She feels a strange connection to this anxious little boy and partners up with him in the Peer Helpers Project. Together they create a beautifully simple display for the Friendship Fair.  As Calli begins to discover what makes her shine, the rest of the Gold family finds another side to being a winner – one that doesn’t shout out for all to notice.

Read Calli Be Gold by Michele Weber Hurwitz to find there may be many ways to be number one. After you read it, let us know are you a “loud” or a “quiet”?  Have you found your passion, or are you still looking for the thing that makes you gold inside? Leave us a comment and let us know.