11 Birthdays: A Wish Novel
Written by Wendy Mass
Narrated by Kathleen McInerney
4/5
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About this audiobook
Wendy Mass
Wendy Mass is the New York Times bestselling author of The Candymakers series, Bob, and many other novels for young readers, including the Schneider Family Book Award-winner A Mango-Shaped Space, Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life (which was made into a feature film), Every Soul a Star, Pi in the Sky, the Twice Upon a Time series, and the Willow Falls series that began with 11 Birthdays. She and her family live in New Jersey.
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Reviews for 11 Birthdays
352 ratings42 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Cute, sassy book about a girl, a boy, a repeating shared birthday. Loved it!
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Very creative premise and a winning heroine.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I really liked this book. I liked the end when Amanda said to Leo, "It's a date" and the mom said "You two are way too young to be dating." I listened to it on tape from the library. I'm really glad my mom got it for me.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Amanda and Leo are fated to repeat their 11th birthday over and over again, unless they can figure out why their eleventh birth day keeps repeating, regardless of what they do. Not one of my favourite Mass books, but still enjoyable.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cute! Amanda is stuck reliving her 11th birthday, a sort of Groundhogs Day type of plot. When she discovers that her estranged best friend Leo is going through the repetitions too, they work together to try to get time to start up again.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5A cute story about Amanda and Leo, a pair of 5th graders who were born on the same day and became best friends who spent every birthday together until the year they turned 10. When Amanda overheard Leo saying something not-so-nice about her to his friends, her feelings were hurt and her friendship with him destroyed. Now she faces spending her first ever birthday without him.However, when strange things begin to happen to Amanda on her eleventh birthday, she realizes that Leo is the ...more A cute story about Amanda and Leo, a pair of 5th graders who were born on the same day and became best friends who spent every birthday together until the year they turned 10. When Amanda overheard Leo saying something not-so-nice about her to his friends, her feelings were hurt and her friendship with him destroyed. Now she faces spending her first ever birthday without him.However, when strange things begin to happen to Amanda on her eleventh birthday, she realizes that Leo is the only person who understands what she's going through and the only person who can help put things back to normal. The two seem to be reliving their 11th birthday over and over again, and no matter how they try to make things different, they can't figure out why they are in this time loop or how they will ever break free of it.This "Groundhog Day" like scenario - wherein characters experience the same day over and over again until they figure out why they can't seem to move forward - is cute, although the reasons behind it are a bit light. Too, some things don't make sense. For example, Amanda has only played the drums in her basement, is 100% self-taught and has never performed for anyone, yet she can read music well enough to impress a pair of older rock band members and even successfully try out for the marching band. The characters are supposed to be 5th graders yet they are already in middle school (not sure what part of the country has 5th grade as part of middle school instead of elementary), and although it is supposedly the end of the school year (June 5), no mention is made of this.These minor quibbles aside, it's an okay read for older grade-school kids but probably boring for middle schoolers.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5It's like the movie Groundhog Day, but for middle schoolers!!!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5this book is full of adventures and discoveries!!!when i was reading it i just could not put it down!!!!
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5My daughter read this book several times, she loved it!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Amanda and Leo share a birthday and have been best friends for as long as they can remember. They always have their birthday party together until the year they turned 10 when they had a huge fight and stopped speaking. Now it's been a year and Amanda's turning 11... but something happens and every time she goes to bed, she wakes up on her birthday again! Can Amanda and Leo figure out how to stop the loop or will they be celebrating their 11th birthday forever? I liked the story, but it's not one of my favorites. I'd hand it to 4th-6th-graders who like realistic fiction like Andrew Clements.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Forced to relive their 11th birthday until they get it right, former best friends Amanda and Leo find out that it all has to to with an enchantment placed on their feuding forefathers 100 years ago. Readers will enjoy the humorous details in this tale that will remind adults of "Groundhog Day." My only quibble is that the reason for, and person who performs the original spell are kind of sketchy.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Because it was funny when they kept repeating there 11th Birthday
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Everything was great
I really enjoyed it very much.
Wendy Mass is very talented - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Very interesting and fun to read. Can’t wait for the next story!
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5NOT BAD I THINK.... GOOD? IT'S GOOD I LIKE IT
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5It was a nice book to read, I enjoyed it very much
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5It was interesting and a bit funny but most of all it was an adventure
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Amanda and Leo were born on the same day. They were actually born at the very same hospital! After they shared an accidental first birthday party, the two celebrated all of their birthdays with each other until and became best friends. Amanda and Leo did everything together until their tenth birthday. Their party came with some drama, and Amanda vowed she was never speaking to Leo again after the way he embarrassed her. She hasn’t spoken to him for a whole year, and now that their birthday is here, she can’t help wonder who will show up at her party, and who will be at Leo’s. From the start, her 11th birthday is a bit of a disaster—she has a pop quiz she wasn’t prepared for, her gymnastics try out is terrible, and then her party is even worse. She doesn’t like the “costume” theme her mom planned, especially because her outfit is uncomfortable and her shoes pinch her feet giving her blisters. Plus, almost everyone is at Leo’s amazing party. Amanda can’t wait to go to bed and have her birthday be over and done. Only when she wakes up it’s her 11th birthday again. And each day it keeps happening- no matter what she does to change things. It isn’t long before Amanda and Leo realize they are the only ones reliving this day with “memories of what happened before”. Now they have to figure out how to get to Saturday, the day after their birthday. Can they figure out what to do? Is there any way to get things back on track? What would make for the best 11th birthday? You’ll have to read this realistic fantasy fiction book to find out.
I have read other books by Wendy Mass, but 11 Birthdays is my favorite book by her so far. Amanda and Leo seem like very realistic kids, and I enjoyed seeing the different ways their birthday played out. It gave me a lot to think about. What would I do if I could relive the same day over and over again? Would I do anything wild to see what would happen? Or would I try to do everything okay and by the rules so I would be able to deal with things the next day if it ever came? I like the stories of friendship and the different turns of events because it showed how all of our actions ripple out— even in ways we do not see. Change one thing about your day and there will be surprise impacts from that act all day (especially if you know how the day went originally). I would recommend this book to anyone in fourth grade and up who enjoy books about friendship and a little bit of magic. I noticed this is the first book in the Willow Falls series. I look forward to checking out the rest. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Fairly well-done 'tween adaptation of the concept also seen in the movie Groundhog Day." Addresses issues of friendship and growing up. I do wish the characters had been a little more complex, richer - more real to me."
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Children's fiction/audio. It's really difficult to pull off this kind of "groundhog day" story without wearing it out. The author does ok with it, considering the mediocre plotline.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Super sweet story. I thought she captured the age pretty well, except you never would have caught my friends and I dancing in a public setting when we were 11. But I appreciated that there was no romance or even hints in that direction. She also handled the concept in a original way. It would make a good read-aloud to an elementary class, maybe even middle school.
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- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wendy Mass is such a great story-teller and never panders to her (pre)adolescent audience -- it makes for enjoyable reading and always makes me wish I thought of that idea! This book is a Groundhog Day-esque repetition of Amanda and Leo's 11th birthday. They have been friends since birth, thanks to the influence of a quirky wise woman who works a little magic. After a misunderstanding and rift at their 10th birthday, the two must reconcile not only for themselves but for the greater good of their community. How they do this (do-over! and over!) is sweet and entertaining. I love that the story still promotes girl-boy friendships just as hormones are starting to kick in.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This book is about a girl named Amanda and a boy named Leo. When they were growing up they had their birthdays together every year. One year Leo and his friends were talking and his friends asked him why he was friends with a girl and he told them that they had their birthdays together so he didn't want Amanda to be mad, Plus she doesn't have many friends. When her mom came home Amanda was outside crying on the front door step. When Leo's mom told Leo what happened he was embarrassed. In the middle of the book they both keep repeating their birthdays over and over and over again, but they didn't know that it was happening to both of them. It was the enchantment that Amanda's great-grandfather had on him and Leo's great-grandfather had on him; they died and the curse went on to Amanda and Leo when they stopped being friends.Then the very next day they meet each other right in front of the school and decide on a plan on why this is happening to them.At the end of the book they finally stop having their birthdays over and over and over again when it finally turns Saturday. Then they are friends again because the curse is over for now unless they don't have the apple seeds then the cycle starts all over again.I thought this book was great because it had a lot of adventure in it. They had to work together a lot. The plot was very unusual. I didn't know how it was going to end that's why I kept reading it. I liked how the author keeps writing; in every book she wrote there are different characters, not the same ones. It was really exciting because there were some words I didn't now and I solved it. The characters had some hard times but they solved their problems together.
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- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Not going to lie, Groundhog Day is my dream-come-true, so this was an enjoyable story for me. I just love the concept. The protags are a bit dense, but that's to be expected from 11 year olds.
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- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Very enjoyable!
1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Very fun fiction story, especially for 5th grade girls! I enjoyed the "Groundhog Day" aspect to Amanda and Leo having to relive their 11th birthday over and over. A great friendship story.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Fast and light read. Had a hint of magic and humor in it. Characters were easy to enjoy and believable. Great story.
1 person found this helpful
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5This was a cute story in the living-a-day-over-and-over genre. Amanda is stuck in her 11th birthday, and she can't figure out why. Does her fight with her former best friend and birthday-sharer Leo have anything to do with it? I would like to continue with this series, though I hope they all aren't the same premise of living one day over and over. The narrator was pretty good too, so listening to the series could be an option.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5First off, I started reading this without knowing that the birthday in question - June 5th - is actually my own birthday, and that may have predisposed me a little bit towards liking this book, but I didn't really need any extra incentive: It was a thoroughly charming, light read that I'd recommend for most 9-12 year olds.
Point A) There's nothing gender-y about this book: Although I personally don't think there's such a thing as 'boy books' and 'girl books' you do sometimes come up against kids who are dead set against reading anything they identify as belonging to the other team. It's a fight I'm not going to stop fighting, but in the case of this book, there's no need to fight it - having both male and female main characters, both of whom are fleshed out pretty well (even if we get more of the female MC POV) is a strong selling point.
Point B) The Groundhog Day on your birthday is a plot that every kid will be able to appreciate: there's nobody who doesn't fantasize about having their day, over and over again. Or reliving a bad day that was supposed to be good until it comes out the right way.
Point C) It's funny. Not hilarious, but witty little moments here and there that show that Wendy Mass gets how kids think and how friendships really work, that there's jealousy and joy all mixed in and muddled together.
Point D) It's the first in a trilogy, which is always a selling point for me. I love to revisit good characters, see how they're doing. - Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Wendy Mass does not disappoint fans with her newest novel 11 Birthdays - an excellent new novel about the power of friendship that will delight readers everywhere with is uniqueness and creativity.
Let me just say that 11 Birthdays could have easily received a 5 star rating. Don't get me wrong - I certainly enjoyed it, but I didn't love it, for one major reason: it's lack of depth. It's certainly an well-written and entertaining story, yet it lacks the depth it needs to receive 5 stars.
The characters in 11 Birthdays were average compared to other YA novels. The characters lacked the characterization they needed; they ended up feeling quite 1-demensional. They were definitely unique and realistic, but they just didn't have that extra characterization I was looking for.
The plot is most definitely unique and creative! Before anything else, let me just say that I really enjoy Wendy Mass's writing style! Anyway...the plot is really realistic and creative. It's not like any other YA novel; it's a bit of realistic fiction mixed with a dab of fantasy.
Wendy Mass is definitely an author to watch and I will definitely continue reading her stories. Young readers will definitely enjoy 11 Birthdays - especially fans of "friendship stories." Until then...Wendy Mass, keep writing! :D