Stephanie Zvirin (Booklist, Apr. 1, 2003 (Vol. 99, No. 15))
Codell, author of an award-winning adult nonfiction book, Educating Esme (1999), about teaching in an inner-city Chicago school, brings her experience to bear in this debut novel. Sahara is a quiet, self-conscious kid, who misses her absentee father and can't seem to fit in at school. When her poor school performance and letters to Dad she's hidden in her desk come to light, she's put in Special Needs, an experience so dreadful that her mother pulls her out for another crack at fifth grade. As it turns out, her new teacher is just what she needs to build confidence and set her on a path to becoming a writer. It's meant to be Sahara's story, but it's her teacher, "Ms. Pointy," who takes over. Pointy's audacious, yet caring, demeanor and her undisguised disdain of educational bureaucracy will be a revelation to kids, who will see narrator Sahara as a sympathetic, but pale, second stringer. Codell works in wonderful metaphors and important life lessons, but that's not always enough to carry the peripatetic goings on, which come across as two parts message and one part story. An upbeat and certainly well-intentioned novel, but flawed. Category: Books for Middle Readers--Fiction. 2003, Hyperion, $15.99. Gr. 4-6.

Elisabeth Greenberg (Children's Literature)
Sassy observant Sahara breaks your heart as she sinks into the morass of Special Needs. Grieving for her father's loss, she just can't bother with schoolwork, especially when she can escape to books in the public library. The apt images of her diary--"working with the teacher in a hallway is like being the street person of a school"--put you right into her mind and her milieu. By the time she fails fifth grade and admits her ambition to be a writer in the second chapter, the reader is rooting for her. When she meets the teacher from "Somewhere Else," you are hoping just as hard as she is that this grown-up punk rocker is going to change her life. As Miss Pointy makes a list of "yes" rules instead of "no" rules and writes a schedule that includes Puzzling and Time Travel, Sahara sees a gleam of hope in her future, and so do you. Miss Pointy thinks school is someplace special and being a real person is more important than playing the teacher role; she transforms the lives of her students. In class Sahara makes and loses friends, cowers inside her shell and reaches out to others. When she finally gains the confidence to share the story of her name and her pride in being Sahara Special, you breathe a sigh of a relief and know, just know, that this girl is going to make it, thanks to a teacher who is fully present in her life. Read this book! 2003, Hyperion Books for Children, $15.99. Ages 8 to 12.

Susie Wilde (Children's Literature)
Codell has fame as a teacher, a children’s literature expert, and now she is writing novels for children. Those who have read her popular Educating Esme: Diary of a Teacher’s First Year, will find obvious similarities in her first novel. The comparisons to the teacher, particularly, are unmistakable and sometimes feel a little self-serving. But the main character is one seldom seen in the pages of a novel. Fifth-grader Sahara Jones is a talented writer, a committed reader, but her father has left and she comforts herself by writing him a pile of unsent letters. When her schoolwork falls off and these letters are discovered, she is labeled a “special” student, which basically means she sits in the hall with a series of ineffectual teachers. Sahara’s mother is furious and gets her daughter’s label removed. Happily, Sahara’s new teacher, Miss Pointy, is magically unconventional and refuses to read old school files or follow designated labels of past teachers. Best of all, she is patient and stubborn enough to outwait Sahara’s unwillingness to learn and caring and wise enough to mend her with storytelling and the allure of stickers. 2003, Hyperion, $15.99. Ages 10 to 12.

Kirkus (Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 2003 (Vol. 71, No. 6))
Sahara Jones really is Sahara Special. Although she's given the name because she receives Special Education services, it becomes a true description of the person hidden within her. Her mother recognizes these hidden depths and demands that she be removed from Special Education and given the chance to succeed or fail by her own will. Enter Miss Poitier, usually called Miss Pointy, an extraordinary new teacher who teaches "time travel," "puzzling," and other odd subjects. She challenges, probes, inspires, praises, chides, and otherwise awakens Sahara and most of her classmates. Sahara has always written in her secret journals, tearing out pages and hiding them in the back of the "900" shelves in the public library for them to be found and marveled at by some future reader. Some of her writing, especially unsent letters to her runaway father, have been confiscated and placed in an official school file. Now she has a school journal, read only by her teacher. At first terrified of writing anything that will be seen by a teacher, she spends her time really listening, soaking up the evocative vocabulary that fills every discussion, and immersing herself in the poetry that Miss Pointy provides without comment or direction. When she finally allows herself to raise her hand in class, to open herself to friendships, and most of all, to write from the heart, she recognizes that she truly is Sahara Special. Codell has created a remarkable, unforgettable cast of characters. Sahara's first-person account beautifully and poignantly captures her tenuous steps to a sense of self-understanding and maturity that is rare indeed. Oh that a teacher the likes of Miss Poitier could really survive and multiply in our regimented, standards- and test-driven public schools. An absolutely lovely debut for children from the author of Educating Esmé (1999). 2003, Hyperion, $15.99. Category: Fiction. Ages 10 to 14. Starred Review. © 2003 Kirkus Reviews/VNU eMedia, Inc. All rights reserved.

Vicki Arkoff (Midwest Book Review, "Vicki's Bookshelf" column, June 2003)
The exotically-named Esme Raju Codell has been an overnight sensation not once, but twice -- once in a good way. She's the author of the best selling "Educating Esme: Diary of a Teacher's First Year," a remarkable non-fiction account of her tumultuous teaching career, as difficult as it was brief. Her follow-up book is her first novel for children, and it too takes place into the classroom. Never mind that the author spent only two years teaching; Codell's passion for educating children is plainly evident in this fictional tale, a thinly-veiled portrayal of herself as an idealistic new elementary school teacher. She mirrors many of her own traits in the book's protagonist, Sahara Jones, a fifth grader who needs special education. Sahara is secretly writing a book filled with letters to her estranged father, expressing her love for him and wishing for his return. When her mother insists that Sahara is taken out of special education, she repeats fifth grade where she meets Miss Pointy, a teacher who has an unconventional way of teaching, and recognizes Sahara's flair for writing. With "Sahara Special," the author has found a way to rejoin her students in the classroom: by recreating them fictionally (as well as herself), complete with lesson plans and seating charts. The book's message about an unfairly labeled -- but talented -- student and the teacher who inspires her is clearly a direct reflection of Codell's own trials and tribulations as a controversial teacher who refuses to play by the rules. That Codell does so with such humor and spunk is a revelation to celebrate. 2003, Hyperion, 180 pages, $15.99.

Deborah Stevenson (The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, April 2003 (Vol. 56, No. 8))
There are two stories of Sahara’s life: one, the file the school keeps on her, containing her yearning letters to her absent father and information about her educational Special Needs; two, the narrative she herself writes and secretes in a special spot in her beloved library. The arrival of an enthusiastic and iconoclastic new fifth-grade teacher, Miss Pointy, heralds an educational change that means growth for everybody in the class, but especially for Sahara, who finally receives the encouragement to allow her to become publicly the writer she is privately. Though there’s some wishful unreality both in the level of Sahara’s writing skills and in the portrait of the colorful Miss Pointy (who’s rather a cliché of the eccentric and inspired teacher), Codell has a plainspoken yet vivid creativity of expression that gives the story an effervescent enjoyability (“A teacher who had a brother who ate dirt! A teacher who would lend you two dollars!”). The book is knowing about classroom dynamics, making the most of its economical characterizations of Sahara’s classmates, but ultimately it’s Codell’s firm championing of her underdog narrator that provides the satisfaction here (“If they kept files on grown-ups,” says Sahara sagaciously, “it would be a different story, wouldn’t it?”). Readers may yearn for their own Miss Pointy, but one hopes they get the real message even without her: their voices are theirs to find. (Reviewed from galleys) Review Code: R -- Recommended. (c) Copyright 2003, The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. 2003, Hyperion, 208p, $15.99 and $16.49. Grades 5-8.

Horn Book (The Horn Book Guide, Fall 2003)
Miss Pointy, the new fifth-grade teacher, has her work cut out for her, with shy Rachel, outspoken Sakiah, angry Darrell, and Sahara Jones, fifth grader for the second time. Though Miss Pointy perhaps too often has the perfect response, she is a real teacher, plagued by worries and ego and a sharp tongue. She joins the constellation of fictional inspirational teachers who serve as models for students and teachers alike. Category: Intermediate Fiction. 2003, Hyperion, 177pp, $15.99. Ages 9 to 12. Rating: 2: Superior, well above average.

Sharon Dollins (The Lorgnette - Heart of Texas Reviews (Vol. 16, No. 2))
This touching book is about a special needs girl who is placed back into a regular classroom in the fifth grade. She knows that her mother has requested this, and she doubts her ability to do anything right when she is with "normal" kids. Miss Pointy, a new teacher, reaches out to all of her students and builds their esteem and self-worth by her unusual teaching methods. Sahara is especially touched and shows her talent for writing and as a result, discovers her true self. It is a beautiful book and rewarding to read. Fiction, Highly Recommended. Grades 5 and up. 2003, Hyperion Books, 175p., $15.99. Ages 10 up.

Lisa A. Hazlett (VOYA, December 2003 (Vol. 26, No. 5))
Sahara Jones has hit rock bottom. After her parents' divorce and father's subsequent abandonment, she submerged herself in writing him volumes of unsent letters, journaling, and reading. Gradually, Sahara ceased schoolwork, failed fifth grade, and became a "special needs" student. Sahara's mother, unapologetic regarding her divorce and angry at Sahara's behavior, demands a return to the regular classroom for concrete learning and accountability. Deep down Sahara agrees, but she has avoided reality for so long that she fears failure and peer stigmatization. Enter Madame Poitier, an eccentric, witty, and wise teacher extraordinaire, unlike any Sahara and her inner-city Chicago classmates have experienced. Madame cannily uses fables and journaling to reach students, and as the year progresses, Sahara realizes that everyone has problems. As she witnesses the positive transformations of even her toughest classmates, Sahara writes about her dream of becoming a writer to Madame, giving her strength to destroy her unwritten letters and move forward. Intermediate girls will adore Madame and this journey of classroom redemption narrated by Sahara. As with most novels that feature a journal format, Sahara's writing sounds more professional than youthful; switching from her almost unbroken commentary to her slick journal entries can be jarring. Characterization and respective motivations are weakened by Sahara's single viewpoint. Her and her mother's wildly disparate divorce reactions need additional explanation. Another curiosity is from Sahara's mother. Her response to Sahara's long-awaited breakthrough is to denigrate journaling and muse that suburban students should learn more useful things. Nevertheless, these minor flaws detract little from the teen appeal of this engaging story. VOYA CODES: 3Q 4P M (Readable without serious defects; Broad general YA appeal; Middle School, defined as grades 6 to 8). 2003, Hyperion/Disney, 175p., $15.99. Ages 11 to 14.