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806

A Novel

ebook
1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available

Sibling 1 throws blenders and plays guitar. Sibling 2 is allergic to everything and is into magic. Sibling 3 is a varsity swimmer with a group of female fans. Enough said.

The only thing they have in common is their biological father, and the only thing they can agree on is that they all want to meet him.

With the help of a broken-down, "borrowed" Jeep, KT, Jesse, and Gabe make their way across the country evading police, trying their luck on the slots, and meeting a life-changing pig, all to track down Donor 806, their father. Any hope of success requires smarts, luck, and ingenuity. Good thing they have each other...even if they don't see it that way.

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    • Publisher's Weekly

      January 1, 2018
      With a theatrical flair for comedy and drama, songwriter Weil (I’m Glad I Did) offers an improbable but hilarious road trip story about three St. Louis teens seeking out their shared sperm-donor father. When the three meet in person, rock-band guitarist Katie “KT” Lambert, who narrates, is disappointed to learn that she’s related to two of her least appealing classmates: “dumb jock” Jesse and “bookwormy nerd” Gabe. Nonetheless, she agrees to join them on a spur-of-the-moment trip west to find their father. Thus begins a series of misadventures and mixed-up identities that has the threesome traveling on highways and back roads to a tattoo artist’s mountaintop retreat, a celebrity golf tournament, and a rock star’s mansion. Fortune and misfortune are painted with broad, colorful strokes, and readers will enjoy predicting how the outrageous adventure will end. Although the protagonists appear stereotypical at first, their family backgrounds and other problems add depth to their characterizations. Besides learning to accept their differences, KT, Jesse, and Gabe come to appreciate what they have left behind. Ages 13–up.

    • Kirkus

      December 15, 2017
      Three St. Louis teens, half siblings conceived by donor insemination, embark on a summer road trip in 2008 to find their shared biological father.Trying to track down her biological father, budding musician and songwriter KT learns she owes her existence not to her mother's ex-husband, who left before KT's birth, but to donor 806, selected on the basis of his Cryosperm profile (Harvard degree), who's elected to remain anonymous. Using a donor-sibling registry, KT locates two half brothers among her classmates: Gabe, a nerdy amateur magician with allergies, and Jesse, a handsome, popular athlete. Gabe recently learned of his DI conception. Jesse was told early. With his lesbian moms splitting up, Jesse hopes his bio dad might offer new options. After a setback, the three head out on a wild quest featuring lucky, if unlikely, coincidences, including clerical and spelling errors. Settings include the sperm bank, a car wash/brothel, a seedy casino, and a celebrity golf tournament to aid people with color blindness. Like a TV sitcom, the plot relies on titillating sexual innuendo (DI mechanics are played for laughs) and exaggerated characterization. Cliches and cultural stereotypes abound. The white teens' discovery that 806 is African-American, to everyone's dismay, is wince-inducing. The satire of celebrity vanity and self-absorption is funny (the author's an accomplished lyricist, a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee) but tangential to the plot.Risque adult fare in teen drag. (Fiction. 14-18)

      COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

    • Booklist

      February 1, 2018
      Grades 9-12 In a dizzying swing of revelations, KT learns that she was conceived with the help of an anonymous sperm donor, identified only by the number 806. Within weeks, KT has met two half-siblings with the same donor father, and they embark on a road trip to track down their bio dad. Improbable? Definitely. But realism isn't the objective in this fast-paced, humorous novel by renowned songwriter Weil. The three half-siblings begin as stereotypes: KT is a cynical musician; Jesse is a handsome jock; and Gabe is a nerd allergic to everything. As they travel cross-country from St. Louis to Los Angeles in a dilapidated, borrowed Jeep, they make brief acquaintance with an assortment of two-dimensional characters and navigate their way out of implausible perils, all the while forging an unexpected bond of familial affection. The whole adventure is inexplicably set in 2008, which is not quite historical but not quite contemporary for today's teens. Still, it explores the real issues confronting children of sperm donors, albeit not as believably as Natasha Friend's The Other F Word (2017).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)

    • The Horn Book

      July 1, 2018
      Rocker KT learns her absentee dad was actually a sperm donor. Two male classmates--a jock and a nerd--turn out to be KT's half-siblings, and together they travel cross-country to find their biological dad, Donor 806. With weak characterization, dated cultural references, and fantastical plot twists, not much is believable in this road trip story; forgiving readers may enjoy the goofy, madcap tone.

      (Copyright 2018 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

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  • English

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