Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe, Jo Watson Hackl
Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe, Jo Watson Hackl
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Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe

Author: Jo Watson Hackl

Narrator: Tiffany Morgan

Unabridged: 4 hr 9 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 02/25/2020

Synopsis

Eleven days. Thirteen clues. And one kid who won't give up. Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe is "part treasure hunt, part wilderness adventure, and all heart" (Alan Gratz, New York Times bestselling author of Refugee).

How far would you go to find something that might not even exist?

All her life, Cricket's mama has told her stories about a secret room painted by a mysterious artist. Now Mama's run off, and Cricket thinks the room might be the answer to getting her to come back. If it exists. And if she can find it.

Cricket's only clue is a coin from a grown-over ghost town in the woods. So with her daddy's old guidebook and a coat full of snacks stolen from the Cash 'n' Carry, Cricket runs away to find the room. Surviving in the woods isn't easy. While Cricket camps out in an old tree house and looks for clues, she meets the last resident of the ghost town, encounters a poetry-loving dog (who just might hold a key to part of the puzzle), and discovers that sometimes you have to get a little lost . . . to really find your way.

About Jo Watson Hackl

Jo Watson Hackl was born in Biloxi, Mississippi, not far from Ocean Springs, where her favorite artist, Walter Anderson, lived and once painted a secret room. When Jo was eleven, she moved to a real-life ghost town, Electric Mills, Mississippi, and spent the rest of her childhood exploring the woods and encountering signs of the former inhabitants. Mr. Anderson's secret room and the ghost town were Jo's inspiration for her debut novel, Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe. Jo lives with her family in Greenville, South Carolina, where she raises fruits, vegetables, and many, many weeds.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Matthew

Review copy provided by NetGalley Another tremendous piece of realistic fiction about a girl dealing with parental loss and family instability. Cricket is an introspective protagonist, a girl who manages to make sense of what most would consider an overwhelmingly challenging family life, and her stor......more

Goodreads review by Siusan

Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe but Jo Watson Hackl was an amazing read about a girl named Cricket who has been abandoned on more than one occasion. She has grown up with a mother who has mental health issues, her father who’s job requires him to travel for extended periods of time for work, a gran......more

Goodreads review by Carol

Read these opening paragraphs and hear voice oozing out of every sentence: "Turns out, it's easier than you might think to sneak out of town smuggling a live cricket, three pocketfuls of jerky, and two bags of half-paid-for-merchandies from Thelma's Cash 'n' Carry grocery store. The hard part was gett......more

Goodreads review by Skip

I'm not sure that I read the same book as the other reviewers on GR. I thought this was very slow, sad, and implausible. I did not much enjoy Cricket (the main human character), who spends the entire novel preparing to be reunited with her mother, after fleeing into the woods from her Aunt. The book......more

Goodreads review by Virginia McGee

The setting for Smack Dab in the Middle of Maybe by Jo Hackl is a ghost town smack dab in the middle of Mississippi with bodock* tours and a personal library collection featuring Mississippi writer Willie Morris’s book North Toward Home. Even before I read the author’s notes, one of the unusual char......more

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