Operation Yes
"...the entire tale is purest stagecraft:
quick, funny, sad, full of heart, and irresistibly absorbing."
--- *starred* review
in the American Library Association's Booklist
"the heart can transcend the challenges of war." --- Winner, AudioFile Audie Award
“Be kind, for everyone you know is fighting a great battle.”
It’s just a rectangle of tape on a plain linoleum floor. Ten feet long, four feet deep, at the front of a sixth-grade classroom near an Air Force base in North Carolina. But when Miss Loupe steps into the space, it becomes a putting green. A prison cell. A stage. And she teaches her students how to make that magic—theatre—happen as well.
Bo loves the improvisation exercises: They focus his restless energies and distract him from his father’s impending deployment overseas. But Gari has more important things to worry about—like getting her mom home safe from Iraq. When Miss Loupe’s brother goes missing in Afghanistan and Miss Loupe herself breaks down, Gari, Bo, and the rest of the class have to improvise their way through their own “great battles” . . . and find a way to help their teacher fight hers.
The first middle-grade novel about the home front during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Operation Yes is a poignant, funny, and generous book about an amazing teacher and the students she inspires.
One of the Top Ten Arts Books for Youth 2009, American Library Association's Booklist
Cybils Middle-Grade Fiction Short List
2010 Audie Award Winner for Excellence in AudioBooks