Isabel in Bloom

by Mae Respicio, Danice Cabanela (Narrator)

A girl discovers a connection between her home in the Philippines and her new home in the U.S. through a special garden in this middle grade novel that celebrates nourishment and growth.

Twelve-year-old Isabel is the new kid in her San Francisco middle school. It’s the first time in many years that she’ll be living with her mother again. Mama's job in the US allowed Isabel and her grandparents to live more comfortably in the Philippines, but now Isabel doesn't really know her own mother anymore.

Making new friends in a new city, a new country, is hard, but joining the gardening and cooking club at school means Isabel will begin to find her way, and maybe she too, will begin to bloom.

In this beautifully rendered novel-in-verse, Mae Respicio explores how growth can take many forms, offering both the challenges and joy of new beginnings.

Genres: Middle Grade, Poetry, Novel In Verse, Realistic Fiction, Family, Childrens, Fiction

3 pages, Audible Audio

First published April 9, 2024

About the author

Mae Respicio writes heart-filled middle grade novels including The House That Lou Built, which won an Asian Pacific American Libraries Association Honor Award in Children's Literature, was an NPR Best Book, and was named to many "best of" and state reading lists, Any Day With You (out now), and How to Win A Slime War (out fall 2021). Find her at www.maerespicio.com.

Reviews

[kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Isabel in Bloom is a story of a young girls journey moving from the Philippines to San Francisco. It’s a story of family, friendship and finding your feet. Uplifting, heartwarming and beautifully crafted, Isabel in Bloom has most definitely found a place among my favourite novels in verse and is one I’d recommend to children and adults alike.

[Zana · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars rounded up.

The immigrant childhood experience is really relatable, but the novel in verse aspect didn't really work for me. It felt too choppy and I wanted so much more out of the descriptions and the FMC's feelings.

I liked some verses in a couple of the poems.

From "Be Yourself (But Don't Mess Up)":

Marcus says, really loudly,
Ya sound like my lola!
and kids around us crack up.

Melissa turns
her eyes passing mine
meeting his.

He snorts. She shakes her head.

Only kind words in this room, please
says Mrs. Kapoor.

In every class until lunch
through all the other intros
no one else has
an accent like mine
—or even has one at all.

And from "How It Started":

The cruise ship brochure had

 bedrooms for princesses
 blond kids with big smiles
 slipping down water slides
 and happy, silent servers
 working mile-long tables
 topped with towering cakes.

In every brochure

 the workers looked like Mama
 the kids looked nothing like me.

[TL *Humaning the Best She Can* · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cloud library app
-----

[Andrea Beatriz Arango]

I blurbed this one and loved it! This novel in verse is about a young girl transitioning from living with her grandparents in the Philippines to joining her mom in the US, where Isabel's mom has lived and worked as a nanny for the past five years. ISABEL is the perfect companion to Something Like Home, so if you know a kid who loved Laura's story, I would definitely recommend giving them this one.

[Becky • bookmarked by becky · Rating 5 out of 5]

Isabel In Bloom is a well-crafted novel in verse that vividly portrays Isabel's thoughts and emotions as she leaves the Philippines and moves to San Francisco to live with her mother. Her mother moved to the US several years prior to work as a nanny so she could support their family back in the Philippines.

Respicio's book skillfully combines a collection of poems that delve into the difficulties of immigrating to a new country, leaving everything that feels familiar behind - home, friends, food, and garden. However, through generational storytelling, Isabel learns about the experiences of her extended family members who previously immigrated to the US. She realizes that unexpected challenges can bring new opportunities. Her resilience helps her start afresh, make new friends, and establish new roots.

Once again, I paired the audio and physical book. Denise Cabanela narrated Isabel's story beautifully, and I loved hearing the proper pronunciation of Filipino names, foods, and customs.

Isabel In Bloom Is a perfect fit for Poetry Month! Don’t miss the author's note as she explains her process for writing a NIV book and how her poetry garden took shape. She creates thoughtful prompts that encourage writing your own poetry. Perfect for teachers or parent-middle grader’s buddy read.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a sweet middle grade verse novel about a 12-year-old Filipino girl, Isabel, moving to the United States. Her mother left to work as a nanny in the U.S. when she was very young, and Isabel has been raised by her Lolo and Lola. Her mother has now graduated from nursing school and can take care of Isabel. Isabel wants to see her mother and be near her, but she knows she's going to miss her grandparents and friends. Her Lolo loves to garden and owns a gardening place, and they often garden together.

Isabel has a rocky initial start at school, but she discovers an uncared for school garden, and begins to take care of a plant there that also grows at home. When she joins the cooking club, she makes friends and discovers people willing to help out in the garden. But then the school threatens to tear down the garden to use the space for portables.

I enjoyed the verse and I love Isabel. I wanted more of everything and wished there had been more.

[Melanie Dulaney · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a warm and wonderful NIV for middle grade readers! Yes, the premise of moving to a new place and finding that you can be happy there has been a theme of many books over the years, but this one adds some historical context plus such a variety of poetry in addition to the positive message that it will not feel like a “re-do” at all. Isabel lives with her grandparents in the Philippines while her mother has been in the United States working as a nanny in order to help both her parents and her daughter live a better life. But five years is a long time and when mom tells Isabel it’s time for her to move to the states to be with her, she isn’t at all sure that she wants to leave friends, family and the garden that are all so important to her. There are lessons in making friends, respecting your elders, trying new things, bravely using your gifts/talents, and re-establishing trust all nestled into the powerful NIV format. Backmatter includes a section naming the different types of poetry used and where to find one example of that style as well as text-aligned prompts for students to use in creating their own poetry making this a terrific book to use as a class read aloud or literacy group title. Author Mae Respicio keeps “Isabel” free of profanity and sexual content and the only violence is a neighborhood mugging perpetrated against an AAPI resident of the local nursing home. Representation: AAPI, esp. Filipino, main characters, one key character from school has two dads, Isabel has lived with mom only plus mom and grandparents while never knowing her father.

Types of poetry used at least once throughout the book: acrostic, free verse, haiku, narrative, palindrome, tanaga (indigenous Filipino form), and visual/concrete.

Thanks for sharing a print arc with me, Mae Respicio.

[Lindsey · Rating 5 out of 5]

✨ Review ✨ Isabel in Bloom by Mae Respicio

Thanks to Random House Children's, Wendy Lamb Books, TBR and Beyond Tours and #netgalley for the gifted advanced copy/ies of this book!

This novel-in-verse by Isabel in Bloom is everything I wanted it to be. The book follows Isabel, a 12-year-old who moves from the Philippines to San Francisco to be with her mom after they'd been separated for several years while her mom worked as a nanny in NYC.

Isabel moves through a lot of the feelings of a kid not only immigrating but starting at a new school, being reunited with a parent, and adjusting to being in a new country. She had helped her grandparents plant and harvest flowers to sell in the Philippines. Isabel seeks to find the familiar around her in food and plants, and eventually she works to create a garden at her school to celebrate these connections.

The book is really fulfilling to read as she begins to find points of connection with family, friends and the world around her. I loved the San Francisco setting, and the way she carved out a space for herself via school clubs and her baking and gardening. The book also showed a Filipino intergenerational connection and respect that seemed very true to Filipino culture and I really enjoyed how that played out in this book. Kudos to Respicio on creating such a beautiful story of migration, family, and friendship as Isabel grows and blooms!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Genre: novel-in-verse, middle grades
Setting: San Francisco, Philippines
Reminds me of: Kelly Yang's Front Desk
Pub Date: April 9, 2024

Playlist:
1. Katy Perry - Daisies
2. Ruth B. - Dandelion
3. Dua Lipa - Garden
4. Carly Rae Jepsen - Roses
5. Marina - Orange Trees

[Emily McKee · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really want to give my kids more windows than mirrors, so I like the idea of this book. Overall though, I probably won’t bother to try to get a copy in my kids’ hands.

The “in bloom” metaphor is cliché, as is the community activism (community garden and senior center). And this is yet another novel in verse (these are the new graphic novels, I guess??). The verse definitely had that abrupt, choppy feel—like reading bullet points, or an outline for a story that is unfinished.

I’d like my kids to read books that prepare them to read high school and college level texts. How is that going to happen if so many books now don’t even have a complete sentence? What will they do when they encounter the first sentence of A Tale of Two Cities? And so many of these novels in verse are in first-person PoV…and that person is 12 years old…with the vocabulary of a 12 year old.

Apologies for leaving all my novel in verse complaints on this review (it didn’t affect my stars), but it’s like the 10th one I’ve read in 2024.

[TheNextGenLibrarian · Rating 4 out of 5]

A culinary garden makes a young girl feel more at home.
🪴
Isabel is the new kid in San Francisco after moving from the Philippines. She’s excited to join her mother after so long of them being apart from each other. But America isn’t quite what Isabel thought it was going to be. She’s struggling with the language and making friends. When she joins the gardening and cooking club at school, Isabel finds a common thread between her home and new world she’s living in.
👩🏽‍🌾
This is the perfect MG novel in verse to read in April for National Poetry Month (or any time!) because of the sheer amount of various types of poetry included in this story. This is a great book about family, culture and adapting to a new environment. If you’ve read Something Like Home you’ll love this. Pair it with a school club fair!

CW: hate crime, xenophobia, bullying

3.5

[Melissa · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a testament to resilience, to finding your place in the world, and to growing and thriving even in difficult situations. The author packs layers of emotion and understanding into each poem, all while maintaining Isabel's connection to home and love and family.
From a teacher perspective, I loved the wide variety of poems used - visual poems, tanagas, haikus - and screenshotted several to refer to as I teach poetry later in the year. I also love how Uncle Angelo gives Isabel (and readers) a mini history lesson about how Filipinos ended up in the United States, starting with those who landed in Northern California in 1587. It's a gentle reminder that Filipinos and other people of color have been intertwined with American history before the country even began.

[Sai theengineerisreading · Rating 5 out of 5]

if only I'm good at writing poems, I'll create one to describe how much I love this book.

a novel-in-verse, Isabel in Bloom is Mae Respicio's newest release following a young Filipino girl who braved and traveled from PH to US to be with her OFW mother.

this may be a quick read but it encapsulated a lot of emotions that will appeal to readers who:

1. have working parents (or in this case, one is absent)
2. grew up with their grandparents
3. have been taught to be independent at such a young age

and there's a lot to unpack about this middle grade novel and all of it are bared by the author from her (and others) experiences as a Filipino-American.

overall, I highly recommend this offering from Mae

[Stefanie · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

A story about immigration, culture, mother-daughter relationships and honoring yourself. Great look into Philippine culture and immigration with themes that include the (current and historical) unfair treatment of Asian and Asian-Americans in the US.

Told in verse and while the audio was done well, I might have benefitted from also seeing the print. Author's note at the end talks about all the different types of poems represented in the book. I wonder if she had labeled each one with its type along the way - if not, that would have been beneficial to lend to learning more about poetry and writing.

Read for MHLA Nom Committee

[Jessica Milliner · Rating 5 out of 5]

'Isabel in Bloom' by Mae Respicio is written in verse. It tells about Isabel who moved to San Francisco from the Philippines. She’s the new girl in middle school. In addition, manage her life while living in a different country. The book is beautifully written. It shows how moving to a different place seems hard at first but later you manage. Also, figure out how to do for your community like Isabel did for gardening in the book.

[Christiana Doucette · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite recent novel-in-verse reads. I loved Isabel's story. Watching the school garden grow under her care was full of beautiful imagery. I loved seeing her relationship with her long absent (to support the family) mom, grow like the garden.
I know several kids this will really connect beautifully with, and I can't wait to recommend the story to them.

[Lisa Ball · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sweet novel in verse. Interesting read about a girl moving from the Philippines to San Franciso to live with her mother finally. Not a topic I have seen a lot in books.

[Ms. Yingling · Rating 3 out of 5]

E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus

Isabel has been living with her lolo and lola in the Philippines in 1999, helping them garden so they can earn a living by selling their produce in the market. Her mother has been in the US for five years, working as a nanny to three children in a wealthy family while studying nursing. Now, she is doing well enough to send for Isabel. It's hard to levae her grandparents and her best friends, Cristina and Rosamie, but there's no choice. Soon, she is on a plane to San Francisco, where she is greeted by her aunt and uncle, with whom she and her mother will live for a while, because her mother in job hunting. Her lolo has told Isabel that if she is sad in her new home, she should look for familiar things, and she tries her best to do this. The apartment is nice, and she stays in her cousins' room, since they are at college. There are a large number of family members in the Bay area, some having come to the US in the 1960s and 70s. Some, like her cousin Joss, don't even speak Tagalog, and Isabel worries about her accent. She is glad to pick out new clothes at the mall to wear to Bayview Middle school. Her first day doesn't go particularly well, but she makes some progress as the weeks go on. She is forced into a friendship with Melissa' whose father is her aunt's boss at a senior facility. Isabel rather enjoys visiting with the older people, who remind her of her grandparents, especially since there is even a garden there. She missing the Jasmine Sampaguita that was growing in her grandparents' garden, and when she finds out that her school has a long abandoned garden, she is glad to find the same plant there. She joins the cooking club at school, and some of the members are glad to help her out. When one of the men at the senior facility is robbed, Isabel talks her classmates into doing a fund raiser for the center, which might also help save the school garden from being turned into a location for portable school units. It's hard to reconnect with her mother, especially since Nicollette, a girl her mother helped raise, keeps calling, and Isabel worries that her mother might want to move them to New York. Isabel tries very hard to "bloom where you are planted", and while making a home with her mother in the US isn't easy, in the end, she is glad that the two can be together again.
Strengths: Respicio always has such wonderful grandparents, even if the characters have to part from them. Even though Isabel wasn't keen on coming to the US, I appreciated that she tried to have a good attitude and tried her best to get along with people and overcome bad days. I was prepared for Melissa to be a horrible character and was rather relieved when she was not! The details of 1999 are good, including all of the fashions and teen magazines that Isabel enjoys. The gardening is a fun inclusion, and tweens are definitely fans of baking as well. There's plenty of Filipino culture, the practice of coming to the US to earn money to send back home is an interesting topic I haven't seen covered much in middle grade literature. The practice of sending Balikbayan boxes to relatives in the Philippines was very interesting; I know my mother loved to send me packages when I lived away from her, even mailing me cooked macaroni and cheese in the dead of winter when I was in college. I love the sunny cover on this one.
Weaknesses: While this is a well done novel in verse, if this were prose we might have been able to get more information about Filipino history that is lightly touched on. I'm not quite sure why this was set in 1999, other than to feature the very cool hamburger phone, let the girls spend time at the mall, and have the man at the senior center be a veteran of the Bataan Death March during WWII.
What I really think: Readers who enjoyed LaRocca's Red, White and Whole will find this a much more upbeat look at the immigrant experience, and fans of Respicio's How to Win a Slime War, The House That Lou Built, and Any Day With You will enjoy seeing this author try a different format.

[Tales Untangled · Rating 4 out of 5]

My thanks for the ARC goes to NetGalley and Random House Children's, Wendy Lamb Books. I'm voluntarily leaving a review.

Genre: Children's Literature, Immigrant Literature, General Fiction, Realistic Fiction, Family Fiction
Age Level: Middle-grade, age 7-12 (Seriously, someone older can enjoy this too!)
Format: Novel in verse, poetry
Representation: Multiple nationalities, Gay parents for a side character

Isabel is moving at one of the hardest times—she's 12. And she's not just moving to a different city but across the world to a different country. Can you even imagine the pressure to fit in?

Her cousins are not exactly comforting as they give her advice. And the kids at school aren't always friendly. So what is Isabel to do? She keeps looking for that which is familiar in her new home. Added to all that pressure, the family her mom nannied for is calling. And Mom has a secret that she's not sharing.

My heart went out to Isabel as she tried to figure out how to bloom in San Fransisco.

I thought this book was fabulous. It hits on so many fears that young kids face in addition to highlighting challenges for first generation immigrants. (And how second and third generations might react too.) It is such an authentic book. There is a moment when Isabel gets a "history" lesson on immigration from a relative—this small portion felt a bit forced as an excuse to give the information to the reader. That is a small, couple of paragraphs though. So please, don't let that stop you from picking up this book.

Kindness matters. That is the main theme of the book to me.

I hope you enjoy it.

Happy reading!

[Ali · Rating 5 out of 5]

This bright novel-in-verse felt like such a breath of fresh air. The poetry is personal and intricate, but opens to embrace the story of new beginnings and hope through form and energy. I absolutely loved it. Isabel's mother moved to the US to take an NYC childcare job years ago and now they will finally be reunited in San Francisco. While she's always dreamed of living with her mother, these are huge changes to Isabel--leaving family and friends, the Philippines, and her beloved gardens all during middle school. Oof! When she's excluded at lunch, Isabel discovers the school's former garden and decides to bring it back to life. This book has so many of my favorite things in middle grade fiction--baking club, sharing pads, crying in the bathroom, shrieking at sleepovers, and kids working together to advocate for collective space. While she's working on all these school issues, Isabel is also struggling with what it means to reconnect with her mother (I cried!) and the distress of violence against Asian American elders in their community. Gardens are what connect all these story lines, and I felt deeply that they were a place of belonging and connection across generations and oceans. The author's note is fantastic about creating a garden of poems during her writing process, discussing the different poetry forms used in the book, and providing young readers with prompts to write their own. Danice Cabanela's narration was perfect - it matched the energy of the poetry beautifully. I think this is an excellent summer read. Expect your middle schooler to ask for some pots for the window sill!! Highly recommend!!

[kathy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Isabel lives in the Philippines with her Lola and Lolo (grandparents). Her mother has moved to America for a better life to support her family. Isabel’s mom hopes that one day, Isabel will be able to move to America and have a great life with more opportunities.

For now, Isabel is happy with her grandparents, her friends, and her grandparents’ garden that has jasmine. She wishes she could see her mom more, but the packages she gets from America will have to do for now.

One day, Isabel’s life is turned upside down because she is moving to America. She is leaving her grandparents and best friends. She knows that the kids in America don’t look like her or eat the same food as her. She thought her and her mom would be heading to America together, but sadly, to save money, Isabel travels to America alone.

How does Isabel adjust to the American lifestyle? Is she able to find America as her new home? How is it living with her mom since it has been quite some time that they’ve lived together?

I absolutely loved this book and while I never moved when I was little, this book definitely does a great job portraying how difficult it is for Isabel and understanding the feelings that she feels. The poetry is beautifully written and even if you aren’t into poetry, when you read this book, you don’t even realize that you’re reading poetry because you just want to read more and make sure Isabel is okay.

[Richetta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Welcome to my stop on the @tbrbeyondtours Book Tour for Isabel in Bloom! Thank you to @randomhousekids for the #gifted copy! You can read the full review that includes ideas for teaching at my blog Cocoa With Books (link in bio).

Fitting in. Remembering home. Engaging with community. healing family relationships. This is what Isabel in Bloom by Mae Respicio embraces. This is a beautiful and positive novel-in-verse that will engage you and possibly inspire you to engage in your own community.

(Also, I’m a gardener, so I fell in love with the cover as soon as I saw it! It even inspired me to try a few new flowers in my garden!)

Isabel is from the Philippines, but her mother migrated to the United States before her to find employment. Isabel lives with her grandparents in the Philippines until her mother has established herself enough to bring her over to the United States. The story begins in the Philippines and transitions to California in the United States with Isabel’s big move to reunite with her mother.

She holds onto her memories of gardening and cooking with her grandparents, Lolo and Lola. This is what leads her to join the cooking club and to start the gardening club at her new school. She finds a connection to home with one of the trees that is actually native to the Philippines. This inspires her to clean up her school’s old garden, especially after she hears that the elders in the community used to enjoy it.

I loved the positivity in this story. A big move and reunification with a mother she rarely got to see is a tough situation for a 12 year old. But she is surrounded by loving, encouraging and positive characters from the people she is staying with in California to her teacher to the friends she makes at school. While there are conflicts that Isabel has to deal with, the community in her life outweighs them.

[Jan · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this engaging novel-in-verse for middle grade readers, we meet twelve year-old Isabel (Isa), living with her grandparents in the Philipines, while her mother works as a nanny in New York. Isa resents her Mom’s absence, and is jealous of the family she has been caring for. Yet things are about to change; her mother has found a new job in California and has sent for Isa to join her. She dreads leaving her grandparents, friends, beloved garden, and the only home she has ever known. In California, struggling to adjust to her new life, Isa remembers her grandmother’s advice to look for familiar things when she feels homesick. At school, Isa finds her niche when she volunteers to help revive a garden club program that partners with the neighborhood Asian-American senior center. First-person narration, mostly in free verse, also uses acrostic, concrete, narrative, haiku, palindrome, and an indigenous form of Filipino poetry called tanaga, to express the challenges and emotions of the immigrant experience, from a tween’s point of view. Serious issues of bullying and hate crimes are discussed. This welcome offering helps foster an understanding of the courage required to emigrate in pursuit of a better life. Recommended, for ages 9 to 12, by the SEPA School Library Book Reviewers.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Twelve-year-old Isabel Ligaya has moved from her grandparents' home in the Philippines to reunite with her mother in San Francisco, but everything is so different and she feels out of place. Isa remembers her lolo's advice to find what is familiar, and as she adjusts to her new school, she decides to join the cooking club and also to seek refuge in the old school garden, where she slowly brings a jasmine plant back to life. With the encouragement of new friends, she also revives the school's garden club and a connection between the school students and the folks in the local senior home.

This lovely novel-in-verse covers not only the loneliness and separation that comes with immigration but also the beauty of friendship and the community built by honoring the generations. Isa often draws on the wisdom of her grandparents, who remind her to "bloom where you are planted," and she overcomes her shyness to make friends across the ages. A lovely story that also plays with various poetic forms (and provides an author's note that encourages young readers to try writing with those same forms). 4 stars.

Thank you, Random House Children's Books and NetGalley, for providing an eARC of this book. Opinions expressed here are solely my own.

[Joanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book! I really want it to be named an NCTE Notable Verse Novel in November! It's lovely and poetic, with lots of different forms of poetry, including not just free verse but an Acrostic poem (p.92), shaped poems (like the shrub on p. 131), other concrete poems (like "One Night" which falls across p. 17), a mirror poem or palindrome, that reads the same backwards and forwards, on. p. 214, even a limerick on p. 110!

Reading this book is like taking a Master Class in poetry.

I also love the way the author has divided the book into seven sections, with titles that are remininscent of gardening and plants, and blooming. After all, Isabel has journeyed a long way, all the way from the Philippines, to join her mother in California, and hopes that she can bloom there.

Isabel is a wonderful character, so real and relatable. You can't help sympathizing with her.

This would make an excellent companion read to UNSETTLED, a verse novel by Reem Faruqi, which also features a girl transplanted from another country, and also uses plant metaphors in the sections.

Teachers, especially, be sure to read the Author's Note. Plenty to use here in your classrooms, including writing prompts.

[Ashley Dang · Rating 5 out of 5]

The heartfelt journey told in verse of a girl who moves from her home in the Philippines to the U.S. and her attempts of fitting in and finding her own place, through the nourishment and growth of a special garden. Isabel has lived her whole life in the Philippines but when her mother gets a job in the US and moves her there with her, her entire world is changed as she is forced to try and understand a culture she knows nothing about and try and fit in. From learning to make new friends to finding her own space where she can be herself and find connection, this is a wonderful book. I really felt for Isabel and her journey of trying to assimilate and find her own space in a whole new culture was really interesting to read. I would definitely recommend this book for anyone who wants to read a really heartwarming story! The novel-in-verse format of this book was really interesting and it brings you a little closer to Isobel's thoughts and feelings. Overall, a really great read.

*Thanks Netgalley and Random House Children's, Wendy Lamb Books for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

[Jame_EReader · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thank you @MaeRespicio and @penguinrandomkids for this gifted copy in exchange for my honest review.

I am still feeling the emotions, anxiety and happiness after reading this book. It brought back many unforgettable and unwanted memories after migrating to US during my childhood days. The anxiety of going to school, trying to acclimate, comprehending the same-difference situations, being homesick, missing all friends left behind, the food and daily lives, the sampaguita (jasmine flower) and mostly the “smell” of familiar surroundings of being with lolo and lola were some of the things being pointed out in the book. I love how the book introduced many fascinating things about newly immigrated Isabel and the comparisons to the US-born Filipino-Americans kids. Mae Respicio has done a wonderful job sharing, showing, writing and offering her wonderful ways of telling stories to younger readers the nuances, challenges, issues and opportunities the stories of young Isabel and her adventures to come. I know my kids will be reading this book this upcoming holiday simply because they heard me smiling and tearing up after finishing it.

[Alexandria Williams · Rating 5 out of 5]

🌱Step into the vibrant world of “Isabel in Bloom” by Mae Respicio.

A delightful tale bursting with heart, humor, and life lessons that every kid and grown-up needs to hear!

Join Isabel as she navigates the ups and downs of being in San Francisco while reconnecting with her roots from the Philippines.

From the struggles of adjusting to a new country, new city, and new school to finding her place in a gardening and cooking club, Isabel's journey is both heartwarming and inspiring.✨

———————————————————————

“I’ve found my place
I’ve spread my roots
And now
I turn my face
to the sun
and I
bloom.”

Isabel's story is filled with moments that will make you laugh, cry, and cheer her on every step of the way.

Mae Respicio captures the essence of growth and resilience in a way that will leave readers feeling uplifted and empowered.

Plus, with valuable lessons about friendship, and the power of finding joy in the little things, this book is not only perfect for kids but also a fantastic addition to any homeschool curriculum!

🌷So grab your gardening gloves and let Isabel's adventures inspire you to bloom wherever life plants you!

Thank you for the book!

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading this sweet, uplifting middle grade novel in verse was the perfect way to end my reading year. It's a quick read, with a happy ending that comes too easily, but still...I enjoyed its hopeful, wholesome vibe. It makes for a good palette cleanser after a string of darker reads.

Isabel is a sympathetic character. Even if you've never moved from one country to another, all of us have experienced being the "new kid" in some form or another. It's easy to empathize with Isabel as she navigates life in a foreign environment, battles homesickness, and learns to trust the mother she barely knows. I loved watching our heroine use her unique talents to not just find her own place in her new life but also to inspire other kids to help those in need. Her story is inspiring, teaching valuable lessons about teamwork, speaking up about things that are important, the power of the natural world to bring people together, service to others, etc.

I lived in the Philippines for a year as a teenager and the country still holds a special place in my heart. It was fun to be reminded of its sights, smells, tastes, and traditions through this story.

[Michelle Kidwell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Isabel in Bloom
by Mae Respicio
Pub Date 09 Apr 2024
Random House Children's,Wendy Lamb Books
Children's Fiction



I am reviewing Isabel in Bloom through Random House Children's, Wendy Lambs Books, and Netgalley:


This middle grade novel celebrates nourishment and growth through a connection between a girl's home in the Philippines and her new home in the U.S.


Isabel is a 12-year-old new student at her middle school in San Francisco. It will be the first time in many years that she will live with her mother again. As a result of Mama's job in the US, Isabel and her grandparents could live more comfortably in the Philippines, but now Isabel doesn't really know her own mother.


Getting to know people in a new city, a new country, is hard, but joining a gardening and cooking club at school may help Isabel find her way, and maybe even bloom.  



This middle grade novel in verse is beautifully written and highly recommended!


I give Isabel in Bloom five out of five stars!


Happy Reading!

[Courtney · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
Isabel in Bloom stands out even among the books-in-verse I’ve read in being a solid combination of both experimentation with poetic forms and having an ongoing narrative interweaving all the poems. I loved how different verses would be written in acrostic style, or haiku, or even palindrome, alongside the “typical” free-verse style I’m more used to, not to mention an indigenous Filipino style called tanaga. These different styles added a lot of character to the narrative, while also educating newbies to poetry and verse about the flexibility of the genre.
The story at the heart of it is also really interesting, following Isabel as she moves from the Philippines where she was living with her grandparents to live in the U.S. with her mom. The story chronicles her day to day life as she learns typical lessons young people learn about respect for one’s elders, culture, and heritage, trying new things, and coming into your own. Definitely recommended for all ages.