This was a pretty strong ending to the Terupt series. The characters were clearly older in this story, which was nice to see. They have lost a lot of their childhood senses of wonder and naivety from the first book. There was some cussing, romance, and more mature humor with this book. It’s like the series evolved with the readers.

With that being said, it did feel almost like Buyea ran out of ideas for some of the characters here. Jessica’s story with her relationship with her father and her poetry seemed SO irrelevant to the overall story. Then, with Anna’s story of her mother getting remarried, it was resolved just before the halfway point of the book. Similarly, Jeffrey’s eating disorder conflict lasted approximately 50 pages before it was over, and then he just wrestled. It really seemed like many of the characters had run their course by this book and, perhaps, needn’t have all been included.

One of the things I really liked in this book was the bucket list idea. Each kid kind of spearheaded some part of their Terupt Bucket List, and that was super cute. I do think it would’ve been even better, though, if Terupt would’ve had an individual conversation, or something heartfelt, with each kid during the course of the project. That would’ve been a really cute ending, but even without that, the bucket list was still a good decision by Buyea.

To read more of my review, check out
https://yalitreader.wordpress.com/2023/04/09/goodbye-mr-terupt-by-rob-buyea/