Though repetition of facts and dialogue (including the brothers’ penchant for calling each another “Booger”) at times thwarts the narrative flow, its pace accelerates in the final chapters as Lai adds a few surprise ingredients to concoct a deeply satisfying ending for this heartwarming immigrant story about sibling bonds, honesty, and surmounting obstacles. In her hilarious, emotional middle-grade debut, Remy Lai delivers a scrumptious combination of vibrant graphic art and pitch-perfect writing that will appeal to fans of Real Friends. School is torture, making friends is impossible. When Jingwen moves to Australia, he feels like he’s landed on Mars. Pie in the Sky is a funny, touching, heartbreaking, and utterly uplifting exploration of what it means to be an outsider in a community that struggles to. Publishers make digital review copies and audiobooks available for the NetGalley community to discover, request, read, and review. Jingwen vows to make the 12 cakes, believing this will preserve his memories of Papa-and that “cakes make everything better.” But his baking obsession leads to the betrayal of his hardworking mother’s trust, landing him and Yanghao in hot water. Remy Lai, El Deafo meets Inside Out and Back Again in this funny, emotional illustrated middle-grade debut novel about immigrating to Australia, being upstaged by an annoying little brother, baking cakes and overcoming loss. Pie in the Sky Remy Lai 9781250314093 NetGalley NetGalley helps publishers and authors promote digital review copies to book advocates and industry professionals. Summoning memories of baking with Papa, Jingwen imagines the cakes they’d anticipated selling at Pie in the Sky, the bakery they planned to open upon moving. The boy mourns the loss of his father and feels like an alien among his fifth-grade classmates as he struggles to learn English, which sounds like “Martian words” (blue-tinged illustrations show others, then the boys, as space aliens in their daily life). She is the author-illustrator of Pie in the Sky and Fly on the Wall. She was born in Indonesia, grew up in Singapore, and currently lives in Brisbane, Australia, where she writes and draws stories for kids with her two dogs by her side. Lai centers her incisive illustrated novel debut on Jingwen, who moves from his unspecified home country to Australia with his mother and younger brother Yanghao after his father’s death. Remy Lai studied fine arts, with a major in painting and drawing.

Pie in the sky by remy lai