Donorboy by Brendan Halpin

Some of the main themes in Donorboy are grief, trust, acceptance, and the definition of family. The author is discussing both Rosalind’s and Sean’s loss of their mothers at young ages, their ability to learn to trust and accept each other and other people, and how to be a person that you can like.

Through the e-mails and texts Rosalind, the main character of the book, learns to accept Sean and her new situation and maybe most importantly she learns about love and family. Throughout the novel, many situations show Rosalind opening up and trusting Sean and herself. While this progression was slow throughout the book, one situation really causes Rosalind to change. Rosalind finds herself in a terrible situation with drugs at a friends house and sends Sean a secret text that he was able to understand and come rescue her.

The book had many interesting sections but a few stood out to me. The first one is in a journal entry that Rosalind wrote in her diary where she calls herself lucky even though most people would not find her situation to be good luck. Next, there was an e-mail from Sean to Rosalind where he talks about many things including their great weekend in Philadelphia and how proud her mothers would have been of her. Lastly, at the end of the book Rosalind runs away so as not to experience Christmas day without her moms and Sean tracks her down in New York City and it is clear to Rosalind how much Sean loves her.

Rosalind doesn’t like the person that she becomes after her mothers die. This easily relates to my life in the junior high in the past year and a half (mostly last year though). Last year I was new and I didn’t like the person that I became. I was a suck-up and it got to be so bad I wrote my speech about it this year. I was a big suck-up especially toward all of the 8^th graders who I really wanted to like me as a friend. I have also witnessed some seventh graders this year sucking up to me and to other 8^th graders.

I enjoyed Brendan Halpin’s Donorboy very much. The author developed the character really well and it was easy for me to read because it was written in e-mail style. I would definitely recommend it for next year’s reading bowl. It was a great book.