2013 Printz Honor.

Thrid book of a trilogy. Wish I had read teh first two before it. I might have understood Taylor better.

This book moved rather slowly, especially compared to the last book I finished, but it was still an enjoyable read.

This won a Printz honor award this year. It was pretty good, interesting viewpoint from a young woman with Asperger's.

Brenna has given Taylor such a wonderful voice, it's a joy to read this book for the simple fact of getting to know Taylor and her experience of the world. With her Asperger's, there are things she doesn't get that are obvious to the rest of us, but there are also things she sees and understands that many of us might miss.

In this book she tells the story of her summer in France when she is nineteen and on the cusp of adulthood, trying to gain confidence in her competence to claim independence from her mother and move forward as a full person. It's a relatable and inspiring story.

A paragraph I enjoyed that displays the literalism Taylor must struggle with in her thinking:

I am working hard not the let the "afraid" part win, now that I am nineteen years old. I do not want to be like Stanley in Harold Pinter's play, The Birthday Party, who never left his bedroom and who was at the mercy of his landlady. I am referring to Harold Pinter the playwright, not Harold Pinter my gerbil, who is in Canada with his son, Samuel Beckett, getting looked after by my friend Shauna. Technically, Harold Pinter the gerbil is a female, being Samuel Beckett's mother, but gender can be flexible and so I think of him as male, just as his name suggests.

And a paragraph that I enjoy as a quote:

Numbers are the smallest unit of meaning I know. Words are the next largest unit of meaning, and in spite of the confusion they often bring, I admire their complexities. Words are almost as interesting as numbers. But it is safer not to use words unless you have to.

This was good, not great. A coming-of-age story of a nineteen-year-old girl with Asperger's. The voice was strong, and faithful to the syndrome. It also showed the benefits as well as the difficulties. It had a didactic feel to it, though, which kept me from really getting into it.

Started out slow but then it really became quite a great book! Beverly Brenna I think did a wonderful job of trying to picture the world through Taylor's eyes, and I applaud her for that.

Taylor's voice sounded too young for me to believe she was 19, but other than that, I mostly enjoyed the book. It's hard to find a good book about an autistic woman, so even though it's not perfect, I think it's fairly well done.

Taylor and her mother travel to France with the mother's boyfriend and family. Taylor is selected to be the personal care assistant for Martin the boyfriend's son, who has physical disabilities. Taylor is striving to find independence, will her mother be able to let her go.

I found this book difficult to get through.

This is an incredible book whose power is in the voice of the narrator, Taylor, who spends the summer in France as a caretaker for a boy with special needs. I know Taylor - or I should say, a Taylor, a girl who beats to her own drummer, who desperately wants to be independent, who sometimes has trouble dealing with social situations and her own frustration. And a girl who is incredibly talented, creative, and engaged in life. Through the fiction of The White Bicycle, I feel like I have a better understanding - or at least more empathy - for the Taylor in my life.

There were moments of true insight in this one.