I Am Not Joey Pigza-Book Review

I really enjoyed reading this book, and although it is not a book that I would gravitate towards, I am really glad that I read it. I thought that the title and cover page was really funny when I picked it up, but I was surprised to see that this book contained such a tough topic. I personally feel that this book contains a lot of strong topics that not every child could relate too. Joey’s father finally comes back into the picture and Joey doesn’t know how to feel about it.  A friend of mine father left their family when she was very young and she grew up never knowing what it was like to have a father.  Although I cannot personally relate to this, she has been one of really good friends throughout my life and I have always been there to help her and support her whenever she is missing having a father in her life.  I often wonder how different her life would be if her father was still in her life and if she would be a different person today if he had stayed around.  Although her father is still out of the picture, Joey's father returns and throughout the book you see the effect that this has on him.  I feel as a this being a young adult book this can be a very hard concept for a child to grasp, however it is important for children to be exposed to real life problems in an innocent way such as a picture book.  I appreciate that Jack Gantos took a tough topic but made it light-hearted to ensure that it was appropriate for the age group that he was targeting.  I really enjoyed this message, and I love the main character, Joey, I find him to be very real and relatable. 



Gantos, Jack. I Am Not Joey Pigza. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007. Print.

Flynn, Kitty. "I Am Not Joey Pigza." The Horn Book Magazine 83.5 (2007): 576.ProQuest. Web. 17 Apr. 2016.