I love the way this character thinks :) Quirky and hilarious :) Cedar is 12. She loves spending time in the street or down at Merri Creek after school. Her teenage brother has been sent to boarding school after he go in trouble, her Dad died when she was little. That leaves her and her Mum. When she looses her dog she meets Kite. Together they begin training. Acrobatics. When Cedars dog becomes ill, Cedar works with an eclectic group of individuals all with their own problems and strengths to create a show that help to fund raise for the dogs operation. Its a bumpy ride bullying, injury, group dynamics, a crush and where is her brother? such a pleasure to read! Has some related drug content. ( )

On recently re-reading this I remember why I read it at a younger age and enjoyed it, such a cute and heart-warming story, cleverly written and engaging. ( )

What’s the most difficult part of life when you are a teen or a near-teen? One of the toughest parts has to be trying to figure out how much to blend and how much to be yourself at the same time that the world is telling you to blend, blend, blend. Cedar doesn’t really do blending.

What Cedar does do is people. Cedar has a green thumb for people. One of her friends tells her this, to Cedar’s delight. And thank goodness for that green thumb when your father has died mysteriously and your seventeen-year-old brother is accused of stealing and has run away and your mom is working two jobs and your new best friend Kite has circus parents who’ve split and your Yugoslavian neighbor has a dog who needs a $500 operation.

I can’t possibly tell you how good this book is unless I give you a little sample. Here’s a bit from where Cedar goes to Kite’s house for the first time:

“I met his dad. They lived in a small house with a long hall and windows on only one side. So it was dark and smelled like wet socks and bathmats. The other side was joined to another house that looked almost the same. It wasn’t as messy as you might think a house without a mother in it might be, but it wasn’t swept and stainless and steely, like the Bartons’, and there were no good cooking smells like at Caramella’s. Also, there weren’t any pictures on the walls or things on shelves, like at our house. It was house without things. At least without little things. For me, since I’m a major snoop, it was a bit like opening a photo album and finding it empty.”

I wanted to show you some of the little pictures Cedar draws in the book, but I couldn’t find any online, so I had to take my own, very bad photo of some:



Do you see how good this book is? If you don’t yet, you need to get it and read it and then you will see for yourself. ( )

Caught sight of this book while browsing at the bookstore; read a few pages and loved the distinctive narrative voice and the Melbourne inner-suburb vibe. All the positive reviews I glanced at kept mentioning how cute it was, and I certainly found it cute, which is largely down to the central character, Cedar B Hartley, and her quite charming way of thinking about things. But in general I couldn’t really fault this book. It is utterly engaging – a simple story about an almost-teen who is in self-devised ‘training’ to be an acrobat. Doesn’t sound like much, right? But Cedar is at that beautiful age where she knows a whole lot, or is learning for the first time – but at the same time doesn’t really know anything at all – and this creates such a lovely intelligent naivety that sets the whole tone of the book.

Full review at:
http://bookgrotto.blogspot.com/search/label/The%20Slightly%20True%20Story%20of%2... ( )

From Emily. She told me she likes to read this whenever she wants to feel happy, which is a pretty great recommendation.

I don't read many stories of this age, middle grade books where the protagonist is about 12. Cedar is an adorable one, with about ten zillion things to say. A lot of it is really funny (personal favorite: "I've got better things to do than care about someone's traditional wedding drama") and some of it makes sort of a funny way of describing when she gets upset ("my mind feeling heavy and complicated like a broken-down television").

Her life is often really bittersweet and touching. Her missing hippie brother with the rambling postcards is a really great ingredient. Her neighborhood is fun, and the attention she begins to learn to pay to her mother is nice. Cedar spends a lot of time thinking about family, and figuring out how to be secure in hers. "Four of us was enough to feel like a regular family. Now there's only two, it feels too small to be a real family." The information she gets at the end about her parents, her dad's work and their marriage, is a little odd, but it's an interestingly unique conflict to have in the backstory.

Everything about learning acrobatic tricks and starting the fundraiser circus, major cute. And the fantastic lesson: "'You have a green thumb for people.'" I'm going to remember that one a long time.

The drawings are pretty great too. 3.5 stars all around. Glad to have this, for when I want to feel happy. ( )