Clara Humble and the Not-So-Super Powers by Anna Humphrey & Lisa Cinar (illustrator)

Clara is a nine-year-old cartoonist of @cat comics, and a runner on her school's track team. In her own words,



Claire's two best friends live on the street where she lives. There's Bradley who goes to school with her, and Momo, an elderly neighbour.

The book begins at a school track meet where we are introduced to the rivalry between two schools; Clara's Gledhill gators and the dastardly R.R. Reginald raccoons.




At home afterwards Clara learns that Momo is planning on selling her house and moving into a retirement center. As if that isn't enough, the next day at school Claire and Bradley learn that due to asbestos removal at R.R. Reginald, those students will be coming to Glenhill for a few months.

It looks like there will be disaster on both fronts. Then Clara realizes that she has super powers.


Clara and Bradley come up with plans to improve Clara's Powers and use them to get rid of the R.R. Reginald Reginald raccoons, and convince Momo to stay. You will have to read the book to find out if they are successful or not.

This book is filled with moments of laugh out loud humor. I appreciated how Lisa Cinar's illustrations accentuate this and help us understand Clara more fully. I adored the @cat cartoons!


For the most part the book is filled with strong adults. (Well except when they are clueless about the R.R. Reginald's student's perfidy.) I appreciated how sympathetic the principal towards Bradley and Clara after the final track meet debacle.

I wanted to enjoy this book more than I did, but the bullying at the beginning, and my mortification at Clara's magical thinking got in the way for me. Still, by the time I got halfway through I was completely captivated by Clara and her life. Thankfully, I'm not the target audience for this and suspect I'm going to be in the minority in my response to it.