I liked how you couldn't exactly tell who was who at first. This book talks about all the stuff Jacob can and can't do but doesn't show it in a negative light. Sammy helps Jacob with a lot of things but Jacob helps Sammy too. Everything Sammy struggles with, Jacob is right there and vise versa. They have such a lovely friendships and they're so accepting of each other. This book shows that if you really want to do something, you'll learn no matter what. There'll be bumps in the road but if you keep trying and don't give up, you'll succeed. ( )

I would rate this 4 stars because I was confused on who was Jacob and who was Sam from the pictures. Once I figured it out, I thought it was pretty cool how the child with the disability was white and the other boy was African American. It was significant because this book was published in 1980. The book starts off with what Jacob can do. It focused on how he was such a caring, thoughtful person. It also showed progress, that he could still learn simple things such as knocking on the door. Overall, a very simple, realistic book. ( )

This was a very good book. It address the stuff he can do and stuff he can't do. I like how it doesn't just talk about the things that Sammy does for Jacob like he is dependent on someone else, but it also talks about the things that Jacob does to help Sammy. It also talks about how he doesn't get things the first time, but he is able to get things eventually, which shows that he has perseverance. The only thing I don't like about the book is that it doesn't state the disability that Jacob has. This won't be helpful for the children because they won't understand why he can't get things the first time. However, a teacher or a guardian could explain the disability to the child or children to help them better understand Jacob and how he learns. ( )

Jacob is a 17 year old boy with some form of mental disability probably teetering on Autism. The narrator tells the story about how Jacob is his best friend and how Jacob is very good at certain things, but he has trouble in other areas. The narrator focuses on all of the things Jacob is good at. For example, Jacob knows every make and model of every car he sees on the road, a skill he is helping the narrator learn to do as well. The Narrator and Jacob work together a lot in the story, like when they go shopping and Jacob helps carry the groceries and the narrator remembers everything they need to get. While the narrator does find some things that Jacob did to be annoying, the narrator never got angry and always helped Jacob to figure out the different social situation. Jacob was extremely friendly and always showed support to the narrator, like when the narrator was learning all of the different types of cars. ( )

This book is about a boy named Sam and his very, VERY, best friend named Jacob. They live next door to each other and Jacob likes to help Sam with many different things. What I found interesting about them is that Jacob is 17 years old and Sam is only 8. Throughout the story, Sam teaches Jacob things as well, like how to knock on someone's door before opening it.
I really enjoyed reading this book! It was so good for me to see that despite these kids differences, they were the best of friends. At first when I was reading this book, I didn't even realize that there was something different about Jacob. I like that the author really didn't focus on the disability , but focused more on him as a person. The author shows that we should accept people who are different, like Jacob, and put the person first rather than the disability. ( )