She's Not Like Other Kids
Characters: Katie Welker (with appearance from her mother, Monica, her boyfriend Nathan, and the people in her apartment complex)
Premise: A ten-year old deals with the fact that she's vastly different from everybody around her.
I first read this in the third or fourth grade and it had a completely different cover (though to be honest, I prefer this one which is a 2010 update). Our main character is ten-year old Katie Welker who as stated in the title, has silver eyes, is telekinetic, and can talk to animals, which makes the people around her uneasy and some are pretty hateful in their attitudes towards her. Honestly, in some ways, this reminded me of a mixture of Roald Dahl's Matilda and Stephen King's Carrie (just the telekinetic part, not anything else, though I've only watched the two movies based on King's book) and I found myself redrawn to Katie and sympathizing with her as she deals with living with her mother again after being raised by her Grandmother who has recently died. Honestly, though, I feel like her mother, Monica, just didn't know how to connect with her, especially since she has powers.
Later, Katie learns that the reason she has powers because her mother handled some a specific type of drugs (they never said what type), implying that it was the exposure that made her a carrier, and that there are other kids out there like her, which makes her curious and wanting to reach out the families to find out whether or not their children like her, indicating that she wanted to belong, to fit in, and honestly, that's relatable. Don't we all want to fit in on some level? Sure, having powers would be cool, but unlike Dahl's Matilda who reveled in who she was while being a sweet child, Roberts' Katie is isolated even though like Matilda, she's sweet, if maybe a bit more grown up than other people are used to.
Katie does make a friend in the building, Annie Michaelmas (dubbed by Katie as Mrs. M) and her cat, Lobo. She also has to deal with a new tenant in her building, Adam Cooper (whom Katie affectionately refers to as "Mr. C", investigating her, but before she discovers this, he had made friends with her and her mother, and for a while, the two seemed to be hitting it off as children and adults sometimes do, but she of course grows frightened when she realizes that he's asking around about her and investigating her. Then she overhears a conversation he has with one of the neighbors and she gets frightened and runs away, thinking she's wanted for her grandmother's murder even though the woman had fallen down a flight of stairs and she runs away.
Eventually, Katie finds other children that are like her and it turns out that Adam Cooper is a teacher from a place called the Institute Of Psychic Phenomena and he wanted go invite her there, which, my dude, you bungled that up so badly! Katie also realizes that her mother was worried sick about her and does love her in her own way even though she didn't know how to relate to her.
Though it doesn't say whether or not Katie or any of the other special children end up going to the Institute, I felt that it ended in a good place (let's be real, life isn't always so open and shut being tied up in a neat little bow) and that Katie and the others would be just fine. The book was just as enjoyable as I remembered and I'd give it a 6.
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