# And Then, Boom!

**Author:** Lisa Fipps
**Grade range:** Grades 4–5
**Page count:** 257
**Genre:** Juvenile Fiction
**ISBN-13:** `9780593406335`
**ISBN-10:** `0593406338`
**Canonical URL:** https://readinglist.school/book/and-then-boom
**License:** [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) — please credit ReadingList.school when citing.

## About this book

A gripping new novel in verse by the author of the Printz Honor-winning Starfish, featuring a poverty-stricken boy who bravely rides out all the storms life keeps throwing at him Joe Oak is used to living on unsteady ground. His mom can’t be depended on as she never stays around long once she gets “the itch,” and now he and his beloved grandmother find themselves without a home. Fortunately, Joe has an outlet in his journals and drawings and takes comfort from the lessons of comic books—superheroes have a lot of “and then, boom” moments, where everything threatens to go bust but somehow they land on their feet. And that seems to happen a lot to Joe too, as in this crisis his friend Nick helps them find a home in his trailer park. But things fall apart again when Joe is suddenly left to fen

## Where this book is assigned

### Great Lakes Great Books Award

- **recommended** · 4th grade · Michigan — [source: Michigan Reading Association — Great Lakes Great Books Award 2026-27 nominee (official GLGBA nominee press release + nominees list, announced March 7, 2026 at the MRA Annual Conference; Michigan students vote through January 9, 2027) — 4-5 division](https://michiganreading.org/Great-Lakes-Great-Books)
- **recommended** · 5th grade · Michigan — [source: Michigan Reading Association — Great Lakes Great Books Award 2026-27 nominee (official GLGBA nominee press release + nominees list, announced March 7, 2026 at the MRA Annual Conference; Michigan students vote through January 9, 2027) — 4-5 division](https://michiganreading.org/Great-Lakes-Great-Books)

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