Sunny: 05/21/18

Sunny by Jason Reynolds is the third in the middle grade Track series. As with the previous books, this book is told from the first person perspective of one of the track members — Sunny.

For Sunny's story, everything is written in diary form and each chapter includes the image of a bookmark in the corner. The Diary entries begin after starting "Dear Diary." Sunny explains why he does that and not use journal or some other word when speaking to the book in the earliest chapter.

Sunny's voice is poetic — very much like a younger, more hopeful one to Xiomara's slam poetry in The Poet X. There's a Hip Hop vibe to his entries but that vibe is tied into his desire to always be moving.

Now that he's hit a block in his running where he can't focus on the races, he's trying to find new outlets for his need to move. Sunny's story covers that transition from runner to discus thrower. While I've not thrown a discus, I did do shot-put in junior high and found it one of the few track and field events I was actually good at. The techniques that Sunny learns are very similar to the ones I learned, so it was fun to have that connection.

Book four, Lu, comes out in the end of August.

Five stars

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