by Keith Robertson is a story about a young boy, Henry Reed and his summer vacation in America. Henry is the son of a diplomat from Italy who comes to spend the summer with his aunt and uncle in Grover's Corner, New Jersey. In order to learn about American free enterprise for his history and government class, he starts a research organization with a neighborhood girl Midge and records everything in his journal. Henry Reed Inc. is a great novel because of its original story format, its great personalities, and the hilarious incidents that occur.
Henry Reed Inc. is written completely in a journal format. Each entry is dated and the perspective is always in past-tense. In the very first paragraph Henry states his full name, says that it is his journal and his address in case it gets lost, just like a real journal. Even though it is supposed to be just a journal it reads just like a story. Since it is a journal, it puts everything in a Henry's perspective and his very interesting and often humorous because of his slightly odd sense of humor.
Each of the characters personalities is unique and very well written. Each character seems to be like a real person. It is interesting because everybody acts exactly as they should be according to their persona. Keith Robertson has gotten the personalities down to the last detail which makes it incredibly realistic. Often times it is possible to imagine what one of the characters would say or do before they do it.
One of the things about Henry is that wherever he goes accidents seem to happen. Sometimes the accidents are good, and sometimes they are bad. One example of an accident turned good is when Uncle Al gives Henry a research project to figure out how to keep their culvert from clogging up with debris and flooding the surrounding yards every couple times it rains. That day, while Henry's dog was chasing a rabbit, it ran right through the culvert but as the dog was going through he got caught right in the middle.
