Counting by 7s by Holly Goldberg Sloan is a book about Willow Chance. She is a twelve-year-old genius, who is obsessed with nature and diagnosing medical conditions. Her favorite number is 7. She comforts herself by counting by 7s. She doesn’t have any friends. It’s hard for her to find people like her. She is an only child and was adopted by James and Roberta Chance. She has lived a happy life with them until now… One day James and Roberta Chance get into a car accident and die. This rocks Willow’s world. It is no longer comforting to count by 7s. How will she recover? You will find out when you read the book!

My favorite part of the book is when Dell Duke and Quang-ha are watching TV and Willow doesn’t understand what is going on, “Dell and Quang-ha appear to be hunting for two things: Mostly they are looking for acts of violence. (They watch with great amusement as a man in a cartoon gets stabbed in the eye socket with an ice pick.) The rest of the time they seem to be stalking the airwaves for appealing females. When they find either thing, they stop to enjoy the visual stimuli. They call girls “hot.” The girls are not untouchable, like truly high-temperature objects. No. They mean attractive. Dell even yells out “Super-hot.” And I hear Quang-ha say “Smoking!” It all seems very inappropriate. There is a whole language to be learned here. This is an education.” That is my favorite part because I thought it was very funny.

I would recommend this book to people who like books that make you cry because Willow loses a lot but her new friends help her and are like a family. I would also recommend this book to people who like books that they can relate to because even though Willow has a completely different life than I do I can still relate to her loss. Lastly, I would like to recommend this book to people who don’t stop reading if it doesn’t seem interesting at first because it is a little slow in the beginning but then it gets really good. I rate this book 41/2 stars!