A Million Views
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- $8.99
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- $8.99
Publisher Description
Brewster Gaines just wanted to make a video and get a million views - he didn't count on needing friends to get there. From the author of Spontaneous and the Locker 37 series comes a heartfelt story of friendship, family, and filmmaking.
“A well-rounded, heartfelt tale of creativity and family.”—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“A Million Views turns its lens on YouTube fame in a way that’s fun, educational, and inspiring.”—Ryan North, New York Times best-selling author of The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl
“A celebration of the creative spirit in all of us!”—Rob Harrell, author of Wink
Brewster Gaines loves everything about making videos. The planning, the filming, the editing, and especially the feeling of watching his YouTube views tick up and up. So what if he doesn’t have friends to film with or parents who are home every night for dinner? He’s got a phone and a tripod and a lofty goal:
A million views.
But when he enlists the acting chops of charismatic new kid Carly for a ten-second video, he gets more than he bargained for. Her intimidating friend Rosa soon steps in with funding to produce an epic fantasy trailer, and before long, their tiny team is adding cast and crew. What started as a simple shoot mutates into a full-fledged movie production, complete with method-acting cosplayers, special effects, and a monster made out of a go-kart. That’s when Brewster realizes that getting to a million views may be harder than he ever imagined . . .
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Gentle humor buoys personal growth in this character-driven novel of filmmaking and found family by Starmer (the Locker 37 series). Twelve-year-old Vermonter Brewster Gaines, serial loner and aspiring director, yearns to go viral with the YouTube videos he creates. After a rare moment of cooperation with a classmate, skater Carly Lee, results in solid content, he realizes that it has the potential to garner his desired "million views"—if only it had the appropriate resources. Then Carly's privileged friend Rosa signs on as producer, ushering in a growing squad of collaborators, and the project is granted a $5,000 budget, a deadline, and a new life as trailer for yet-unmade film Carly Lee and the Land of Shadows. To the discomfort of control-conscious Brewster, the team grows to include costume-savvy Godfrey Tarkington and his production manager sister Isolde, half-Tanzanian special effects whiz Harriet Joseph, and eager assistant Liam Wentworth. Wryly narrated in the third person and filled with believable, intriguing characters, the narrative twines an in-depth look at the filmmaking process with a rift brewing in Brewster's largely detached family, astutely developing the filmmaker's relationship with his quietly supportive nonbinary sibling and his increasingly tight-knit crew. Most characters default to white. Ages 10–up.
