SuitabookFooter Davis probably is crazy
Susan Vaught
- Reading
- Read alongside the child, pausing after intense investigation or mental-health scenes. Talk about the difference between a diagnosis and a person, and invite questions without requiring immediate conclusions.
- Themes
- Mental illness and identity: Footer’s mother has bipolar disorder and is repeatedly hospitalised; Footer worries that her own episodes mean she may become ill in the same way. The story treats mental illness as disruptive and frightening while also presenting Footer’s mother as still caring for her. It explores uncertainty about diagnosis and identity.
- Mystery, danger and evidence: Footer and friends investigate a fire, a dead neighbour and the disappearance of two children, while Footer experiences potentially unreliable perceptions. The investigation is presented as suspenseful and engaging, but its evidence is complicated by uncertainty about what Footer has witnessed or imagined.
- Family responsibility and support: Footer’s mother is hospitalised, her father struggles to respond to her theories, and Footer receives help from friends, a teacher and a social worker. The family is shown as strained rather than simple: adults may be limited or unavailable, while care also appears through the mother’s concern and outside support.
- Worth knowing
- Consider whether the combination of a parent’s hospitalisation, a killing, missing children, fire imagery, guns and possible hallucinations feels manageable for your reader at present.