Front Desk

Kelly Yang's Front Desk is a funny, big-hearted story for 10 year olds about a girl who ends up running a motel reception while her parents scrub the rooms.

What happens

Mia Tang is ten. Her family came to America from China two years ago, and so far it hasn't gone to plan. They've lived in their car. Her dad has come home with blistered arms from frying food all day.

Then her mum spots an advert. A man called Mr Yao needs someone to run his little motel in California. Free rooms, five dollars a customer! It sounds amazing.

It isn't, really. Mr Yao changes the deal within two days, makes them pay for refunds and bans Mia from the pool. (It's "not good for the environment". Nobody believes him.)

But Mia has found the thing she's good at. Customers keep asking for the manager, so she makes a sign that says Mia Tang, Manager and stares at them until they hand over the money. It works!

Not everything goes so well. A wake-up call rings in the wrong room. She files a spare key by hand and files her finger too. Then there's the man who finds one piece of dental floss in his bin and demands to see every room in the building.

This is where the book gets you. Mia is cheeky and brave and very honest about how it feels when money is always short. Being told there are "ten thousand other immigrants" waiting to take your job is a hard thing to overhear at ten.

She's also hilarious about school. The owner's son Jason is in her class, and she panics and tells everyone her home is a normal house with a golden retriever. What colour is it? "Uhhh … golden?"

Worth knowing before you hand it over

Mia's family meet unfairness and some unkind attitudes about where they come from, and she overhears her parents arguing about whether to quit. It's all told gently and with lots of warmth, but it's real. There's also the odd "hell" from an angry customer.

If you've got a reader who loves a narrator with big feelings and bigger plans, Mia is a brilliant one to meet. And she's quietly in love with English phrases like "a blanket of snow", which I adored.

What to read next

If they fall for Mia, try Kelly Yang's Finally Seen next. Lina is ten too, and she's flying from Beijing to Los Angeles to live with the parents she hasn't seen for five years.