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This short middle grade paperback follows Nora Jean Sampson as she counts down through her much-dreaded fourth grade year. As the year progresses, she obsesses about how skinny she is, deals with torment from obnoxious class clown, Jimmy Lee, discovers Nancy Drew, and participates in a reading contest.

The book introduces many story threads, but rarely resolves them. Basically, it reads as a catalog of things Nora Jean does in fourth grade, without tying them together very strongly. There are some hints at Jimmy Lee's family situation, which might be an explanation for his bad behavior, but this idea is never brought to fruition. Neither does Nora Jean's obsession with her appearance lead to any sort of conclusion. Nora Jean is much the same at the end of her story as in the beginning, and her countdown serves no purpose, as she just starts another one when the summer begins.

The illustrations were probably the most entertaining part of the story for me, and that's completely because of their amazing 80's fashions. Big tee shirts, straight-leg jeans, velcro sneakers, a Dolly Parton Halloween costume, complete with beach ball breasts -it's hard to believe there was a time where we would have taken these things seriously, or just glanced at them as though they were nothing out of the ordinary. There is also one girl in the story who is drawn to resemble Soleil Moon Frye as Punky Brewster. She's on the left:
I have no idea if this resemblance was at all intentional, but it amused me. The one on the right looks oddly familiar, too, but I can't pinpoint why. 

Another bonus of the particular copy of the book which I purchased from my local used bookstore is that it's signed!

It says: Here's hoping you laugh out loud! Mona Kerby

This was not a favorite old-school read for me, but because it was short, I made it to the end anyway. It is (not surprisingly) out of print now, but both the author and illustrator have other titles that would definitely be familiar to contemporary readers. Illustrator Melodye Rosales did the illustrations for the American Girl books about Addy, and Mona Kerby is the author of the 2008 picture book, Owney, the Mail-Pouch Pooch.

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