The Dubious Pranks of Shaindy Goodman
By Mari Lowe
Levine Querdio
Published November 7, 2023
Age 10-14

Awkward and excluded, 12-year-old Shaindy Goodman just wants to fit in with the girls at Bais Yaakov Middle School. When she’s invited by Gayil, the queen bee next door, to help with a series of pranks, she shrugs off her misgivings in favor of acceptance. Helping out with some harmless jokes, even if it means breaking into school, may be her chance to find friendship. Shaindy quickly realizes the pranks are more mean-spirited than high-spirited, and that only certain classmates are being targeted. Naïve to Gayil’s manipulation, she feels guilty but hopes for the best until the mischief and hard feelings are all pinned on her. As she finally understands Gayil’s acts of revenge for an unintended slight, she lets go of her own anger for lessons of penance, forgiveness, and taking responsibility for her actions.

Lowe uses the period of the Jewish High Holidays of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, as well as their lessons, as a frame for this middle grade drama of judgement and atonement. She crafts a well-rounded and sympathetic character in Shaindy, expressing a universal need for friendship and belonging, and the way tweens and teens often make poor decisions in search of them. The plot and pace of the title move quickly through the season, mirroring the way bad choices can often lead to snowballing consequences. Moments of lightness, Shaindy’s struggle with roller blades, and final closeness with her sister help temper more serious content and lead to a satisfying conclusion. In the penultimate scene, a classroom of girls offers each other silent acknowledgment of wrongs and forgiveness for them. The wise words of a teacher, “The hardest thing many of you will do in your lives… is admit you were wrong,” (p 155) is a life lesson for those of all ages and religious backgrounds.