Juana and Lucas - Juana Medina, Juana Medina

I received this book from Netgalley in exchange of an honest review.

Yay! A character, who is a kid, who loves Brussels sprouts! That is really a first in a long time since I saw a kid whose favourite food is this. Normally in books with kids it is all about how they hate it, how they are disgusted by it.
So when I saw this little girl loved Brussels sprouts… well what could possibly go wrong then. And then came the part where she said she loved reading books. A girl who loves books and Brussels sprouts? Wow. That is truly a first I have seen this combination in a book.

I loved how she introduced us to her city, and also told us various fun things about the city. Like the language (Spanish), about the weather and more.

The introduction about her dog Lucas was done really fun (with a drawing of her dog and then all kinds of lines pointing at him, telling us what kind of skills he has, what kind of dog he is). And she did the same for her best friend and several other characters that were important to the story. It is a shame that my tablet broke up the pages, but I am sure in a paper-format this kind of thing looks really nice.

The book is about Juana having to learn English, and how much trouble she is having with it. She also doesn’t get why she should learn English, which gave me a chuckle, though I could understand her. So she pops by various characters to see what their view is on English and why she should learn it. Finally she finds one reason, and what that reason is? Well, you will have to read this book to find out. I do have to say that I loved that reason. It is a fun one, and it motivated Juana enormously.

There was one thing I didn’t entirely like. The Spanish words that were thrown in at random intervals. While I do know some words in Spanish, I don’t know a lot. Some words were just simple and I could easily figure out what they meant, but some of them meant I had to grab my Spanish dictionary (yes, I have one, because a few years back I tried to learn Spanish, and I still want to go back to learning it again).

Also in my copy (pdf) the letters at times turned half invisible which made it really hard to read.

I really loved the illustrations in this one.

All in all? I would recommend this series, and I will be sure to buy the book when it comes out in paperback. Of course I will also keep an eye on the rest of the series (when it comes out) as well.

Review first posted at https://twirlingbookprincess.com/