When Jamila Waheed meets fellow 10-year-old Shirley Bones at a garage sale, she’s hopeful she’s made her first neighborhood friend.
Shirley’s mother is sending her to camp for the summer, against her will. When Jamila confesses that she’s in the same situation, Shirley, who’s a bit of an oddball, says that she’ll convince her mother to convince Jamila’s mother to let them skip camp and spend time together instead. Jamila is skeptical, but Shirley comes through, and before long, the two girls are spending their days together on the nearby basketball court. But instead of practicing, like Jamila, Shirley makes it her home base for doing detective work. When Jamila joins Shirley, the two begin to forge a true friendship—one that their latest case puts to the test. This fast-paced graphic novel set in Canada features a diverse cast of characters featured in drawings teeming with movement, detail, and life. Jamila is a brown-skinned Muslim girl, and Shirley is white. Goerz is a master of character development, making no one into a villain and no one into a saint and giving each a fascinating role to play. While Jamila and Shirley’s friendship is the highlight, it’s only one of many deeply satisfactory layers of storytelling.
Funny comic with child-friendly ideas and inclusive families. Has a very inclusive environment around friendships and the LGBTQA+ world. I loved the comic format and the built-up suspension and the big reveal at the end of how Shirley found out about the theft and how she traced it back to the thief. Teaches a lesson on how you shouldn’t take friends for granted.
Grade 6 student at Hillhurst school
Shirley and Jamila
A Book Review
The book Shirley and Jamila Save Their Summer tells the tale of when Jamila, whose mother wants her to be in science camp, meets Shirley, whose mother also wants her to be in science camp. These two minors quickly bond. Jamila joins Shirley in her detective work, and their brains are quickly put to the test with the latest case: a missing lizard. Through their rifts and schisms, the two begin to form a true friendship—one that will withstand the test of time.
Shirley and Jamila, while vainly trying to catch our attention, fails. The core of the plot—the case of the missing lizard—fails to arouse our interest, as it is just insignificant. We aren’t rooting for the main characters because if they don’t achieve their goal, nothing much will happen. If they fail to find the lizard, well, a few hundred dollars is lost. That’s it. There is no danger, no emotional urgency, no need for them to achieve their goals. All the conflicts in between seem like a desperate attempt to make this a good book, however, they are cliché and are used to little effect. All in all, if the reader doesn’t get invested in the plot, they won’t get invested in the book.
Shirley and Jamila Save Their Summer, with its childish plot and clownish antics will do little to attract any reader. The plot is shallow and the events boring. Thus, I would not recommend this book to any reader except young children. This text will only amuse the most immature of readers. A truly uninteresting publication.
“Shirley and Jamila Save Their Summer” is a graphic novel book in which there are two main characters. Shirley Bones, who is known as the neighbourhood detective and would rather spend her summer figuring out cases than being stuck at dance camp, and Jamila Waheed, a girl who has just moved to the neighbourhood and would do anything to be able to go the the basketball court a few blocks away from her house instead of stuck going to a science camp. The two girls meet at a garage sale and start talking, both in a case of needing to go to a summer camp and both clearly not wanting to. Their mothers end up deciding that they may spend their summer together at the basketball court that Jamila has so desperately wanted to spend her summer at. Jamila is confused about Shirley and her personality, Shirley has never bothered to tell Jamila the strange items she brings to the basketball court and why so many kids are going up to her. Soon after a boy comes up to Shirley and Jamila and proclaims that his gecko has been stolen and needs Shirley’s help…outside of the basketball court. They break the rules and start the case. When a fight happens between the two, they talk it through and make promises. Finally Shirley reveals everything to do with the missing gecko case, in the end, Jamila and Shirley get a load of friends, a best friend ( each other ) and an exciting summer to come.
I personally think that “Shirley and Jamila save their summer” is an exciting and somehow fast paced story that intertwines friendship, humour, family and mystery together!
The mystery that goes with the story is fun and exciting but not scary. It keeps you wondering who did it and it leads you here and there. The mystery themselves are fun and quick, not a never-ending mystery with a deflated ending. Gillian keeps the mystery sweet and short and the ending isn’t too, too big or too, too small. She makes sure that the final mystery is big enough to have us surprised and small enough that it isn’t overly shocking. I just really like how the mystery and it’s ending tied very nicely into the rest of the story.
My favourite parts of the story are the side characters and how friendship slowly weaves into the story. How nobody is perfect and completely not to blame but nobody is terrible and completely to blame. I like how each of the characters have made mistakes and how the reasons for those mistakes are completely relatable and reasonable. I also love how in the end everybody is friends with everybody and how everyone gets their way with a tiny bit of changing. The relationship between Shirley and Jamila is also really interesting. They have never been friends much for majority of the book and their friendship is really tense and that they are only friends so that they get more freedom during the summer, but as the end nears, they start seeing that they almost need each other and that they could be really good friends (for Shirley, Jamila could be her first friend that would actually come to be her friend.)
The humour is also really good. Gillian weaves the humour into the story really well, almost providing comic relief. The most funny character in the book from my perspective would most likely be Farooq, Jamila’s older brother. He does the most sibling-like thing possible, saves Jamila from a fight with their mother, does hilariously annoying things and then provides awesome advice. Exactly the annoying but awesome and funny things a brother would do.
In conclusion, I think that “Shirley and Jamila Save Their Summer” is a great book, a story of friendship intertwined with mystery, family and humour all into one awesome book. I would definitely recommend this book to everyone, especially those who like reading graphic novels and are more on the visual side. The book, as I have said, is really fun and awesome. It also has a good plot and great twists and turns. Readers should definitely consider reading “Shirley and Jamila Save Their Summer.”
I read the sequel to the book I loved it as well as this one and how they want to go on adventures with her best friend and in the second one they always were together and I love how they got mad at each other.
Shirly & Jamila save there summer was a fantastic book. I thought it was a good book because it had adventures and mystery. I liked how there were pictures so you got an idea what the book was about. If i had to rate I’d say it’s would be 5 stars. I wanted to see if Jamila would actually have to go to the summer camp but she didn’t. Jamila was happy because she really didn’t want to go to camp, she wanted to hang out with Shirly. Then they saved there summer.
When I first read Shirley and Jamila save their summer, I got really interested in the book. I love how they have separate liking’s but are best friends. The book really tells you that there will be struggles in friendships but you can get through them. This book is great and I would suggest it to another class mate.
A grade 7 student from Eleanor Hall
Shirley and Jamila, is a fantastic book. It has so much detail and description . I like when Jamila is so smart while Shirley thinks she is a big know-it-all. Shirley and Jamila have so much fun together they are so close they are almost like sisters.