Review: The Newspaper Club

The Newspaper Club by Beth Vrabel
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Right in time for Spring Break, social distancing, and kids needing a good read, The Newspaper Club gives us the story of Nellie Murrow (hat tip to Edward R. Murrow), an eleven-year-old girl who has recently moved from NYC with her mother to tiny Bear Creek, Maine. Nellie's family were newspaper people. Her father was news director for a city newspaper (every real city should have at least two newspapers!) and her mother was a crime scene investigative reporter. Nellie, being raised around the news, is determined to be a reporter or maybe even the publisher of a newspaper. She's always looking for stories and when things seem to be going wrong in the only place in Bear Creek she enjoys, the park, she's determined to find out what's going on. Unfortunately, that means she's likely going to need the help of her nemesis, Min Kim-Franklin, daughter of her mother's best friend. Mrs. Kim-Franklin is a bit too overprotective of Min and Nellie (did I mention she was named after the amazing Nellie Bly?) is pretty sure Min is only her friend because she's been told to be. Nellie, who misses her father a lot (more on that later), has trouble making friends. Her dad has given her a lot of good advice about it though, and in no time, thanks to forming a local newspaper when the one run by grownups is going out of business, Nellie has a bunch of colleagues and friends. There's Thom, the boy that lives across the street, Gloria, the daughter of the local diner owner, shy Charlotte who actually knows the difference between the Chicago and MLA style guides, and Gordon, who is a burgeoning professional photographer at only twelve. Oh, and then there's Min, who is the layout person extraordinaire, and who gives their paper its name, The Cub Report. Together they are going to solve the mystery of what's going on in their park, publish a newspaper, and help Nellie deal with some of her recent life changes.

The Newspaper Club introduces children to important journalistic processes and terminology in an era in which the news, whether in print, social media, or on the radio, or TV, is being called into question. While we might guess what's going on in some of The Cub Report's stories about the park or Miss Julia, Nellie Murrow teaches children about fact-checking and getting those five questions answered- who, what, where, when, and why. And meanwhile, as the reader grows closer to Nellie's true story - Vrabel kind of buries the lede there... - we begin to see that Mrs. Kim-Franklin was so right about Bear Creek being the right place for Nellie and her mom.

A sweet middle-grade novel that is highly instructive, too.

I received an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Want to buy a copy of The Newspaper Club from your local independent bookstore? Click HERE.

This book is not available in audiobook format at this time.

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