Clementine

Title: Clementine

Author: Sara Pennypacker

Genre: Realistic Fiction

Summary: Clementine was not having such a good week. Monday started off with two lucky signs: there were exactly enough banana slices in her cereal: one for every spoonful, and when she got to school, her teacher said that her and a list of other students were excused from journal writing and were able to go to the art room to work on their “Welcome to the Future’ projects.” Her friend, Margaret, was in the art room too. Margaret was in fourth grade and Clementine is in third. Margaret thinks that she can tell Clementine what to do, like in the art room. Margaret told her that she couldn’t touch any of her stuff, so Clementine asked “why” as she always did. To annoy Margaret, Clementine pointed out the window. When Margaret looked out the window, Clementine accidently touched her mask…twice. Everyone always told Clementine to pay attention, but she said she always was the only one who was paying attention in the room. Margaret went to the bathroom, looking like she was going to cry, and a few minutes later, Clementine asked to go. She saw Margaret on the floor under the sink with her head on her knees. Clementine saw that Margaret had a pair of scissors from the art room, so she knew that something bad had happened. Margaret told Clementine that she got glue in her hair and she was trying to cut it out, but it was rather noticeable that a whole chunk of hair was missing over her left ear since her hair was halfway down her back. Margaret handed Clementine the scissors and tol her to cut off all of her hair. Just as they were finishing up, the art teacher saw the end of the situation and sent Clementine to the principal’s office. The principal seemed very sarcastic, as did Clementine. While the principal, Principal Rice, was trying to calm Margaret down, Clementine did what she thought was helpful. She made two appointments for Principal Rice, answered the phone and ordered new school pets. Clementine also drew a picture of Margaret without her hair, but she made her look like a dandelion because she thought they were pretty. Principal Rice gave her a look. Margaret waited for her in the lobby of their apartment building and wasn’t thrilled with the picture. Margaret thought that she wanted her hair to be yellow, or red and it would make her prettier, so she asked Clementine to do it for her and Clementine told her that her mom had a special marker that would make it permanent. Clementine said that there was one time, when her brother, who she calls Spinach, drew all over the walls and they had to re-paint them because the marker wouldn’t come off. Clementine went into the house, got the markers, told her mother that everything was fine and went to Margaret’s room, which she didn’t like because of her cat, Mascara. Mascara reminded Clementine of her cat, who died, named Polka Dottie. Polka had there kittens and her parents let her name them. She named them Fluoride and Laxative, and people immediately bought them. The last one went to Margaret. Clementine also doesn’t like Margaret’s room because it all matches and looks like a magazine. It’s all clean. Margaret picked out a color, called Flaming Sunset, and Clementine colored her whole head, even putting curls on her forehead. Next thing she knew, Margaret’s mother called Clementine’s father and all she could think of was pretending to sleep. She heard her parents walking down the hallway towards her room and she heard her dad say that he thought she was just trying to help. Her parent’s also said that Margaret was always a little jealous of Clementine, but Clementine thought Margaret was perfect and didn’t understand why. The next day at school, Margaret’s mother wrote a note to their teacher telling her to make sure the two girls weren’t alone together. Clementine was very angry and went home to tell her mother. Her dad saw her angry face and did what always calms her down-he let her ride the service elevator, because he had the key. She rode it four times and went back home to still hear her parents whispering about the situation. Clementine decided to ride the elevator up to the fifth floor and apologize to Margaret’s mother. She knocked on the door, and her mother answered. She immediately told Clementine that she couldn’t play with Margaret today because like Margaret, Clementine should be thinking about her actions in her room all day. Clementine went back home and talked to her mother, who was wearing overalls and drawing, like the artist that she was. Clementine said that one day, she might be an artist too and her mother told her she was already an artist and she could be whatever she wants to be. Suddenly, Clementine had the itch to draw. The next morning, Clementine didn’t want to go to school, so she tried every excuse in the book with her mother. When her mother pulled the covers off of her head, she saw that all of Clementine’s hair was cut off! Clementine told her mother that she did it to make Margaret feel better. Clementine went to school, but Margaret was having bracelets put on her teeth, so she wasn’t there. Clementine couldn’t sit still in class so she had to talk to the principal about it. When Clementine got home, she watched from the window to see if she could find Margaret’s purple shoes, and she did. Margaret showed her, her bracelets and Clementine loved them. Margaret loved Clementine’s hair and they agreed that she could color it any color she wants. They knew they were “safe” because Margaret’s mother was out with her “special friend,” Alan. Margaret’s brother, Mitchell, was home when they got upstairs. He thought they were unbelievable. Margaret pulled out a bright green and colored Clementine’s hair, and added curls too! Clementine decided that she wanted to get bracelets on her teeth, because she liked them. Her mother told her no because her teeth were straight enough already and she didn’t need them, which Clementine thought was unfair. The next morning, Clementine told Margaret that they needed to sit in the back of the bus on the way to go because she had a good idea! Clementine got sent to the principal for trying to glue her own hair onto Margaret’s head. Clementine went off about Margaret in the principal’s office, saying that Margaret had breathed on the m&m rocks In the back of the dump truck, which was the best part of her birthday cake, she sat on the sparkle-glitter paint set, which was her best present, and now she was trying to look like her, except Clementine didn’t have braces. Clementine and Margaret began to have fights about a lot of things. Clementine’s dad let her fight the Pigeon War with him, which made her a little bit happier. Clementine knew that Friday was going to be a bad day starting with breakfast, because there were clear parts of the egg and she doesn’t like those. When Clementine went to show her dad a part of her homework, it wasn’t there so she had to check “The Black Hole” again, which was the spot under her bed. Her homework paper wasn’t there and the rest of the day became worse. Margaret sat next to Amanda-Lee on the bus, and Clementine had to be excused from recess to work on her journal writing. When Clementine got home, she helped her dad with the pigeons again. When she went to go back into her house, she heard her mother and father talking about something and she knew it was something about her. She didn’t want to go inside. Clementine tried helping her dad by taking a picture of Polka to a store and making it bigger to try and scare the pigeons away. On the weekend, Clementine wrote in her journal, even though she didn’t have to. She had three hours to waste until she could pick up the picture. Clementine decided to go help the painters on the seventh floor, but they weren’t there, so she decided to put stilts on and continued to fall. In the elevator, Clementine saw Amanda-Lee and Margaret, and they told her that they were going to the mall. After this, Clementine went to the copy shop to pick up her picture of Polka. She was amazed. Clementine had another idea for her father to get rid of the pigeons in the front of the building. She asked Mrs. Jacobi, an old lady who lived in the apartment, to feed the pigeons from the side of the building and she agreed. Clementine went home to tell her parents and they were happy. After dinner that night, Clementine’s mother wanted to get some work done so she went to find her special markers. Clementine told her that they were at Margaret’s, so her parents went over to Margaret’s house to take to her mother and they told Clementine to stay in her room and think about what she did. Clementine’s mother came back and started scrubbing her head to get the green marker out of it. Clementine began to have a better day, and this better feeling made her not think about all of the bad days she had been having the past week. Since Clementine is so good at paying attention, she ran around the apartment building and hung up everything that she knew that Margaret liked: Polka Dottie’s flea collar, Pepperoni, red shoes, a blue jay feather, M&M’s, her charm bracelet, lace, pink sparkle nail polish, a dead bumblebee, red curly hair, and her mother’s favorite hat. When Clementine went to give all of this stuff to Margaret, Margaret had something to give to Clementine, too. She gave her a new sparkle-glitter paint set. Margaret apologized to Clementine for being meant to her on her birthday. They both said sorry to each other and planned to see each other later that night. Clementine went back to her apartment and heard her mother ordering a cake with her name on it! She went inside and said that she was going to clean her room. She wanted it to be just like Margaret’s. She pulled everything out from under her bed, the “Black Hole.” She found SO much stuff, including her homework that she couldn’t find days earlier. When Clementine’s parents came in, she was crying because she had gotten cleaner in her eye, and then she cried even more, telling her parents that she would change. She would pay attention, and she would be a different Clementine. They ran over to her and hugged her, and brought her into the dining room, and there stood Margaret and her mother, and Mitchell with Clementine’s brother on his shoulders. Finally, they all yelled “Surprise” and moved over to show Clementine a cake, which read “Good-bye and Good Riddance!” Below it, it said “Thank You, Clementine-Hero of The Great Pigeon War!” Clementine asked her parents what they had been talking about a few days earlier because she thought it was about her. Her dad went inside and brought in a box and told Clementine to open it. It was a kitten! Margaret’s mother told both the girls that after school the next day, she was going to take them both to get new haircuts. Clementine almost refused the offer, but she said “great!” Clementine sliced the cake and gave everyone a slice. She had two.

Characters: Clementine, Margaret, Amanda-Lee, Margaret’s mother, Alan, Clementine’s mother, Clementine’s father, Clementine’s brother, Principal Rice, Mrs. Jacoby

Plot: Clementine wanted to get back at Margaret for everything she had done, but she got everything off her chest about what had happened at her birthday party, and they ended up being great friends in the end.

Theme: Clementine wouldn’t listen

Setting: school, Clementine’s house, Margaret’s house

Opinion: I thought this book was fun to read. You didn’t know what was going to happen next between Clementine and Margaret. It had a happy ending, which is always positive and I think it kept me on the edge of my feet as I read it.