Palacio’s writing rings with voice, and Wonder is enlivened with detail that takes us-like it or not-right back inside middle school happenings.Īs the story opens, Auggie (for whom life has never been a cake walk) faces a particularly difficult challenge. Can anyone (save his immediate family) get beyond Auggie’s appearance to the phenomenal person behind the face? That’s but one of several provocative questions raised in this riveting tale that grabs readers by the lapels from page one.

Auggie was born with a facial deformity so severe that even after twenty-seven reconstructive surgeries, people find it hard to look at him without turning away. Is that too much to ask?Īuggie is ordinary in some ways: he loves ice cream, sports, and video games.

He wants other ordinary kids to look at him and not “run away screaming” (p. “I think the only person in the world who realizes how ordinary I am is me.” So says 10-year old August (Auggie) Pullman, who longs to be ordinary in the most basic sense: He wants to blend in.