Everything on a Waffle, by Polly Horvath

Review by: Yagyesha Roy

The heroine of this book is a girl named Primrose Squarp and she is residing  in British Columbia( a place I have always wanted to visit). People believe that both her parents drowned at sea, but Primrose thinks otherwise. (You know what? I think "Primrose" sounds too formal and "longish" so  I think I'll just call her Prim. Like Katniss Everdeen's sister in the Hunger Games) 

  Prim's father is/was a fisherman and was out at sea when a bad storm struck. He was late getting home, so her mother dropped her off at a neighbor's house and went off to the sea in a little sailboat, to search for him. She must not have been thinking straight, cause if a fishing boat wasn't coming back, how would a sailboat? They never came back, leaving the town to believe that they had drowned. (insert sad face here)

Of course, no one believes Prim when she says that they are still alive. (Obviously, because then the book would end right there) She ends up staying with Ms. Perfidy, the neighbor her mom had dropped her off at. Ms. Perfidy is an old woman with fading memory, and has a tendency to walk away when Prim is in the middle of a sentence. She's kinda mean and rude towards Prim, always snapping at her and saying she's wrong when she is actually right. Nevertheless, they end up having a special connection. 

Soon, they find Prim's only living relative, her uncle Jack and  move to a house in the town .Her friendship with Ms.Bowser, owner of the restaurant, The Girl on the Red Swing, really blossoms at this time. In this restaurant, everything is served in a waffle from lasagna to asparagus(hence the title of the book). Ms. Bowser teaches her how to cook a lot of things and Prim enjoys her company. She also starts going back to school. The school guidance councilor tells all the students (when Prim isn't there) that they should all be nice to her, because she is going to start bereaving soon. (which she never does and never did) They start teasing her about it, and she tells Uncle Jack and finds out that he believes her parents are still alive too. Uncle Jack is a "developer", so he is always trying to get deals to sell houses. One day when Prim goes with him to one of the sales, something bad happens. She is waiting outside on the road, and out of nowhere, a truck comes, and well, tries its best to avoid her, but still ends up taking her baby toe.

After waking up in the hospital, some more bad things happen. Some people (*cough* Ms. Honeycut + Ms. Perfidy *cough*) think that she was suicidal and stood there in front of the truck with her arms wide open. Of course, she didn't do that. She was kneeling down to stop the bleeding of her leg (she had tripped) when it came. To help her become "not suicidal,'' Ms. Honeycut makes her take home the class pet which she accidentally sets on fire and then manages to cut all of its fur off too.

Everyday Prim goes down to the docks in hopes that her parents will come back. There is more hope now, for a fisherman found her mother's jacket on an island. But ,now that people are thinking she is weird and suicidal, she needs a cover. Uncle Jack thinks up one: she pretends that she is trying to make money by selling fish from the fishermen's catches. One day, when she lies down on the dock, a wave covers  her and a net is stuck on her hand. A nearby fisherman saves her, but she still loses the top part of her pinky. 

      

After this incident, she is  placed in the foster care of an elderly couple, named Evie and Bert. Prim tells them everything, and they move in to a townhouse that Uncle Jack was selling. (they got a deal). One day when they were having dinner at The Girl on the Red Swing, a fire occurs at the townhouses. That puts Uncle Jack in trouble, because the cause of the fire seems to be  faulty wiring. Evie and Bert lose all their stuff, but are still optimistic. Uncle Jack acts as a firefighter, and goes in to save Ms. Honeycut, who also lived there and saves  her life, but she still tries to ''sue the pants off of him.'' 

Despite all these misadventures,the book ends on a positive note though . In the end, she is put in the care of not Uncle Jack, nor Evie and Bert, but someone even closer to her.You will need to read the book to find out who that person or persons are. I am not telling.

I hope you enjoy reading the book as much as I did . It was really humorous and a quick read. It took me just an hour to finish it. I am now looking forward to trying out all the recipes mentioned in the book.Yes, I bake too and I do not serve my bakes on a waffle !