About the Author

Morris Gleitzman started work in television and worked as a screenwriter and newspaper columnist before he started to write children's books. His play, TWO WEEKS WITH THE QUEEN, was produced at the National Theatre. BUMFACE was shortlisted for The Guardian prize and the Children's Book Award. Morris lives in Australia.

Reviews

Gr 5-7-Due to a birth defect, Rowena can't speak but she has plenty to say in this often amusing, sometimes touching, and occasionally odd tale (Puffin Books [Australia], pap. 2004) by Morris Gleitzman. It begins with a car full of rotten apples, a trip to the police station, and a desperate attempt to keep the media from splashing her dad all over national television with a story on the misuse of chemical sprays. Meanwhile, Rowena discovers that the mother she never knew is not buried in Australia as she had been led to believe but was actually the victim of a hit-and-run accident while visiting France and is buried there. Rowena is determined to track down her mother's killer at all costs. She and her father travel to the town where her mother died and find the people there oddly kind and inviting. Her many questions and her search for revenge come to a head in a wild scene in which sheAand then her fatherAis trapped under an old bomb from World War I. There's a lot going on here (perhaps too much) and the ending is a little too neat. However, Mary-Anne Fahey does an excellent job of giving a voice to a young girl who has no voice, and providing plenty of variety and emotion in the telling. Listeners will be caught up in her story and cheer for Rowena along the way.-Deanna Romriell, Salt Lake City Public Library, UT Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information.