Brendan Buckley's Universe and Everything in It Book

Ten-year-old Tae Kwon Do blue belt and budding rock hound Brendan Buckley keeps a "Confidential" notebook for his top-secret scientific discoveries. And he's found something totally top secret. The grandpa he's never met, who his mom refuses to talk about or see, is an expert mineral collector and lives nearby! Secretly, Brendan visits Ed DeBose, whose skin is pink, not brown like Brendan's, his dad's, or that of Grampa Clem's, who recently died. Brendan sets out to find the reason behind Ed's absence, but what he discovers can't be explained by science, and now he wishes he'd never found him at all. . . .

Children's Literature

Ten-year-old Brendan is a budding scientist and has decided to start collecting rocks during the summer. For the most part, he is comfortable in his milk-chocolate colored skin. He has a good pal, and he knows what he wants to do. He can ignore the racist taunts of a few older kids. He can ignore it, that is, until he meets his long absent grandfather who runs the local rock hound club. Now Brendan has to find out why his grandfather lives so close, and yet has never been to his house. It is a book of complexity about society and multi-racial families. Brendan has a white mother and black father. He has one grandmother (father s mother) who stays close to the family. While his maternal grandfather cut himself off. The questions raised are almost as old as the rocks Brendan wants to collect, but fortunately, for Brendan, people can speak to give answers. Reviewer: Amy S. Hansen