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Type of bind: Hardcover
EAN num: 9780060875923
ISBN number: 0060875925
Label: HarperCollins
Manufacturer: HarperCollins
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 256
Printing Date: February 01, 2008
Publishing house: HarperCollins
Age index: Ages 9-12
Release Date: January 29, 2008
Sale Popularity Level: 619658
Studio: HarperCollins
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Product Description:
Bernetta Wallflower is having the worst summer on record. After her ex-best friend, Ashley, frames her for running a school-wide cheating ring, Bernetta can't convince anyone that she's innocent. Her parents ground her until her tonsils grow back, and she's not even allowed to go to her father's magic club, Trunk Number Eight, where she performs every Saturday as a magician's assistant. But what's most terrible of all is that Mount Olive, the private school Bernetta has attended since kindergarten, has decided to take away her scholarship for seventh grade. If Bernetta wants to return to school, she'll need to find $9,000 in three short months. It seems hopeless . . . until Bernetta comes up with a plan that involves a lot of lying, a little bit of trickery, and a mysterious stranger with chocolate-brown eyes.
This is a comic and touching story about losing your footing and finding your way again from the author of The Thing About Georgie.
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Rated by buyers 
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I was asked to give an opinion on this by my friend and school librarian, so this may be colored by the fact that I (34-year-old childless male) am not the intended audience. I'm putting in spoilers, so if you are a kid and want to read this book, don't read this review, 'kay?
The basic story is about a twelve-year-old girl with the unlikely name of Bernetta Wallflower (First problem there -- trying for a memorable name is fine, as long as the book isn't trying to be realistic, but this one is. Bernetta is wacky enough; give her a real last name.) who gets framed for a cheating scam at her private school and gets her scholarship yanked. So over the summer, despite being grounded, she tries to earn enough money to pay for her own tuition the following year, because she wants to be like her older sister, who she worships, and who was the valedictorian at the same school. But since she is twelve, she can't find a job, and since the tuition is $9000 a year, there's no way she can earn enough money over three months, anyway. So she takes up a life of crime, joining a young grifter who watches too many con man movies, and they pull change scams and such at all the local stores. Bernetta's ability to grift comes from the fact that her father is a stage magician, and she has learned both quick hands and the art of misdirection.
And that's fine as far as it goes. But the villain is just too villainous, and the amounts of money involved are, to me, unrealistic. These two kids earn over $5000 in a month, grifting at a local mall and a pier where tourists go; I'm not sure I believe that, though I suppose it's possible. But the villain, who framed Bernetta, earned $5000 from blackmailing students for cheating off of papers that she fed them herself, and I do not believe that a 6th grader could find that many people to blackmail without one of them turning her in before she gets up to that number. She gets her comeuppance, of course, but it isn't anywhere near enough; they grift her out of all of her money, but she doesn't get beaten to a bloody pulp, nor arrested. I also don't accept that Bernetta's parents bought the cover story, that their 11-year-old daughter was actually babysitting, for a couple who only needed her to amuse their two children while they worked from home (because she's too young to be in charge of kids all by her lonesome) and this was going to earn her $9000 over the summer. I want that job. Plus, as a would-be author, I was vastly disappointed when the author missed a perfect opportunity for a good writing moment: there's a scene when Bernetta and her older sister are talking, when Bernetta is despondent because the life of crime is not working out, and the sister gives Bernetta her valedictorian speech to read -- and the speech is about Bernetta and how much she means to the sister. But the speech isn't there. It just says something like, "Bernetta read the speech." How could you miss a chance to put in some real writing, a poignant and sophisticated essay in the form of a valedictory speech, in the middle of this simplified YA pablum? Ridiculous.
In some ways, the con stuff was very good; the grifting was realistic, this is actually a credible way for three young kids to get into a life of crime, and there was a believable end to it, for the most part. I didn't like any of the characters other than Bernetta and her family, but I did like the Wallflowers a lot. And I like the resolution: Bernetta gives up on her attachment to the private school, since that had been the source of her criminal obsession, and just looks forward to what she can learn and experience at the public school. It was nice. It was just too bad I couldn't swallow how she got there.
By the way, my friend absolutely hated this book, mostly because it is directed at 13-year-olds or so -- and it gives them tips and tricks on how to get into a life of crime, some of them very realistic and easy to follow. It shows how to get a grandmother to hand over her wallet so you can take her gift card (If you have quick hands like Bernetta -- but you could also just start running) and how to pull that shortchange thing people used to try doing to my wife when she was a bank teller. And yeah, maybe that's a bad idea with our impressionable youth -- but the kid who starts the scamming learns everything he knows from books and movies that are already out and available, so it didn't seem the worst thing to me.
Rated by buyers -
I've never been inspired to write a review until now, but feel I must after reading this book! I read it after reading several favorable reviews as a possibility for my intermediate classroom library or read aloud. What did I take away from the book? Crime pays! Not a message that I want my students or children to have reinforced. Bernetta is the accused of running a forgery ring for school papers and expelled. She then is happy to meet a new friend at her father's magic club, which she is present at after sneaking out of the house (another bad message). The boy follows her and sneaks into her bedroom (another bad message) and convinces her to meet her without her parents' knowledge. He then proposes setting up a sting/con to earn money for the summer. For unknown reasons Bernetta agrees to go along with it and proceeds to tell one lie after another: to her sister- to enlist her help so she can have an imaginary babysitting job and her parents-she goes everyday to the "babysitting" job and even takes her younger brother along with her on some of the con jobs. After conning numerous people and businesses out of a considerable about of money, her new "friend" helps her old best friend/enemy con her out of all of the money by accusing her of "stealing" her backpack. Spoiler alert-turns out her new "friend" is friends with her old "friend" and had run a similar con job in the past. The lying and stealing continue with the help on the new friend's uncle who helps Bernetta and friend pull one last con on to get all the money back from the "evil" best friend. The kids end up with $10,000 and a summer full of lying and it is not until the last paragraph where Bernetta decides to own up to her family as to what she has really been up to! In my opinion, the biggest betrayal is not friend to friend, but Bernetta to her family. The reader is left with Bernetta having gotten away with crimes and lies with only the hint that she might get into any trouble for it. Not a message that I think any young reader needs to have. Don't include this book in your classroom library!
Rated by buyers 
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Graff's well-rounded characters and compelling plot kept me reading from page one to the end of the book. Any author who can keep me up all night deserves high praise. Well done, Lisa! Will you write a sequel? Please?
Rated by buyers -
Bernetta Wallflower knows two things: 1) a lot of stuff about magic since her father owns a magic club known as Trunk Number Eight, and 2) people who appear to be your friends can turn on you and leave you with nothing.
Accused of running a cheating ring in her private school, Bernetta finds herself without a scholarship to Mount Olive for subsequent year. Because of her problems at school, she is also grounded for the entire summer. She needs $9,000 in her bank account if she hopes to return to Mount Olive for seventh grade, and babysitting appears to be the only thing she is qualified to do. Then Bernetta meets Gabe, a self-professed con artist, and he offers to cut her in on the action he has planned for the summer.
Using the sleight-of-hand skills she has learned at her father's magic club and her natural acting talents, Bernetta joins forces with Gabe to earn some serious money. Instead of reporting to her fake babysitting gig, Bernetta meets Gabe at the mall where they begin running scam after scam to earn the money she needs to replace her lost scholarship. After all, it's for a good cause, so how could anyone object?
Everything seems to be going smoothly until Ashley Johansson shows up. She is to blame for Bernetta's trouble at school and the suspended scholarship, and now here she is threatening even more trouble. Can Bernetta get what she needs and still find a way to live with her actions? One thing she does learn is that everyone has more than one option in life; it's just about which option you choose.
Lisa Graff's THE LIFE AND CRIMES OF BERNETTA WALLFLOWER is a whirlwind adventure in petty crime and accepting the consequences of one's decisions. Graff begins each chapter with a new magic term, and readers will be fascinated with the description of well-known cons used by Bernetta and Gabe. Bernetta's story is sure to entertain, but at the same time present readers with challenging questions about doing the right thing.
Reviewed Author name: Sally Kruger, aka "Readingjunky"
Rated by buyers -
I loved Lisa Graff's debut novel, The Thing About Georgie, so I was eager to get my hands on her new Life and Crimes of Bernetta Wallflower. In Graff's second novel, which again could satisfy readers who love either chapter books or young adult novels with equal ease, the young characters are brought to life with a vibrancy and memorable quality that is hard to find in modern YA literature. Bernetta, Gabe, Ashley, and the rest of Graff's cast are distinct individuals in some amazing circumstances, yet wholly believable as ordinary kids. I imagine that if I'd had the chance to read this book as a kid, I'd feel a very special connection to the characters. As it is, being an adult who spends a lot of time volunteering with kids of Bernetta's age, I found myself appreciating the subtle depth Graff has given all of the children who populate Bernetta's world.
The story itself is so much fun that I spent three straight hours reading the book and couldn't make myself put it down until I'd finally finished it. This book moves along from the very first page right to the last sentence - a true page-turner.
Twelve-year-old Bernetta falls victim to an elaborate "long con," perpetrated by her supposed best friend, Ashley Johansson. Bernetta is framed for running a cheating ring on the very last day of school, and is suspended - and grounded! While she waits miserably to find out whether she will be expelled from her beloved private school, where she hopes to one day be the valedictorian of the 12th grade just like her sister Elsa, she meets a cute and mysterious boy, Gabe. After Bernetta learns that she may return to the private school if she can come up with the $9,000.00 needed for subsequent year's tuition in 12 weeks, she allows herself to be convinced by Gabe that the only way to do it is to become partners in a con game, suckering unsuspecting people at the local mall and the pier.
At very first Bernetta enjoys the "new Bernetta" who is so deft at making people hand over their money, and wonders if this is the person she's always been inside. But after she is double-crossed and loses it all again, she begins to wonder whether the new Bernetta is really who she wants to be.
Bernetta as a character is unique and unforgettable. From her book-page-munching quirk to her skill at sleight of hand, which impresses even her magician father, she is a girl who will remain in your mind long after the book has been finished. Her special relationship with older sister Elsa is poignant and warming. The way she ultimately deals with her enemy and faces up to the consequences of her actions is inspiring.
I found myself wishing for more adventures of Bernetta Wallflower. I don't know whether that wish will come true, but this is the kind of character whose truth and realness just sticks in your imagination, like Anne Shirley.
The Life and Crimes of Bernetta Wallflower will have a permanent place on my list of recommendations to kids and to adults. And I have a feeling I'll be revisiting this book many more times in the future as well.
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