Imagine your mother seems to be normal, but the next moment, she suddenly gets depressed and barely desires to leave her room. She hardly works anymore or even talks with you. That’s what Natalie is dealing with right now in The Science of Breakable Things by Tae Keller.

This egg-cellent book is about a girl named Natalie, who, as shown above, is dealing with issues about her mother. She doesn’t know if she can magically fix her mother’s depression and somber, sudden mood. Meanwhile, Natalie has her own dilemmas at school when her science teacher, Mr. Neely, appoints a journal assignment in which she and her class all have to do an experiment and write about it using the Scientific Method. Natalie thinks she’s doomed since there’s no way she can do it without her sagacious, science-savvy mother. Luckily, Mr. Neely gives her another opportunity for this assignment: enter the egg-drop competition.

Natalie is a little hesitant about this, but the more she ponders about it, the more she wants to do it. Plus, there’s a money prize, which can buy tickets to a place with Cobalt Blue Orchids. She thinks these nostalgic, special flowers can bring her mother back to normal. It’s a good thing she isn’t alone. She gets to do the experiment with another person, and she selects her best friend, Twig, to help her do this. After a few attempts of dropping the egg, they realize their plans aren’t effective. Natalie and Twig almost want to give up…until Dari volunteers to help Natalie and Twig with their experiment. Dari is a smart kid who was already planning on joining the egg-drop contest, but he decides to help the two girls.

Days pass, and the three create more egg designs until they decide on the S’megg: an egg protected by marshmallows and twigs. They did practice egg drops at tall heights at school secretly. Everything was going perfectly, and then the day of the competition arrived. All the eggs plopped to the ground, one by one. Crack! Crack! Yellow yolk oozed out from most of them. Then came the S’megg’s turn. Would the S’megg hit the ground and be safe…or would it crack open? Read the book to find out.

I would rate this book a 4.5/5. A certain romance that was mentioned in there, which I won’t spoil, doesn’t receive much depth. They don’t become official or have a relationship. Other than that, the plot and characters are good. I would recommend this book to realistic fiction readers and people above the age of 8. Hope you read this book, and have a good day.

Written by Kruti Patel