A poignant story about a boy's last summer before his very first day of school. I thought this was amazing, but I have reservations about how children will receive this picture book, as it is fairly wordy and deals with sophisticated themes - death, aging, envy, and fear - in a pretty sophisticated way. Hole does it so well and I am torn.

I loved the illustrations, the sly humor, and Hole's truly impressive ability to peek inside the mind of a child. I'm going to "test drive" this one on some kids in the library today and see if they can appreciate Auntie Ruthie on a skateboard as much as I did!