Book Review of Once for Yes
The Children’s Book Review
Once for Yes
Written by Allie Millington
Ages 10-14 | 384 Pages
Publisher: Feiwel and Friends, Macmillan (2025) | ISBN-13: 978-1250326980
What to Expect: Grief, sisterhood, family, community, resilience, magical realism, and coming of age.
In Once for Yes, which is both tender and imaginative, Allie Millington delivers an inventive and emotionally resonant story about family, grief, and the surprising ways places can hold memories.
With its unique blend of realism and a touch of magic, the story centers on Prue Laroe, an eleven-year-old girl still grappling with the absence of her sister Lina, who left one night and never returned. With her family fractured by grief—her older sister withdrawing, her parents struggling silently—Prue takes solace in the imaginary talk show she hosts in their bathroom, “The Tub-night Show,” complete with an audience that exists only through the landline’s static. Her questions, jokes, and performances are a way of keeping Lina’s memory alive, even as the family begins to unravel.
Millington’s writing is at once sharp, funny, and deeply heartfelt. Narrated by the building itself, The Odenburgh watches over its tenants with gruff affection, lamenting the encroaching “Downtown Disease” of gentrification and the threat of demolition. The novel alternates between Prue’s perspective and that of The Odenburgh, the aging red-brick apartment building where she lives, and this inventive dual perspective emphasizes themes of permanence and change, of how both people and places bear witness to the lives lived within them.
Prue is a memorable protagonist—imaginative, stubborn, and achingly vulnerable. Her voice carries both the humor of childhood and the rawness of grief. The Odenburgh, meanwhile, provides wry commentary on community, memory, and resilience, grounding the novel’s magical realism in a rich metaphorical layer.
With its profound exploration of family bonds, loss, and the essence of home, Once for Yes is a deeply moving and original middle-grade novel. Readers who appreciate character-driven stories with emotional depth—similar to works by Rebecca Stead or Erin Entrada Kelly—will find this one unforgettable. A poignant, imaginative tale about memory, belonging, and the resilience of both people and places, destined to resonate with readers long after the final page.
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About the Author
Author Allie Millington strives to share relatable, accessible truths from unique points of view in her stories. Her debut middle-grade novel, Olivetti, was an instant national bestseller and received numerous starred reviews, as well as a review in the New York Times by actor and typewriter enthusiast Tom Hanks.
You can learn more about Allie and her writing at alliemillington.com.
