FREE: Doing Time Online by Jan Siebold

The listing, Doing Time Online by Jan Siebold has ended.

When Mitch plays a trick on an elderly neighbor, the joke backfires and she gets hurt. As punishment, he has to take part in a police program for juvenile offenders during which he chats online twice a week with a nursing home resident across the state. Of course, he and his elderly partner, Wootie, become friends and end up helping each other, but Siebold pushes beyond formula bibliotherapy here--not only because the computer chat is fun and easy to read but also because Mitch and Wootie are realistic characters, sharp and funny, assertive and needy. Mitch eventually stops blaming the bully who drew him into the mean behavior and apologizes to his neighbor. Things get a bit too upbeat and purposive when Mitch stands up to the bully and wins. But what's best here has nothing to do with bullies or computer chat: it's the background story, told by Mitch, of his home life with his widower dad, a beautifully drawn portrait of a nurturing single parent