For What It's Worth

Author: Janet Tashjian
Publisher: Henry Holt

Imagine you’re having a great time with your friends and first girlfriend, Caroline, when suddenly, things take a complicated turn? Quinn, a fourteen-year-old boy in 1971, is having fun playing his extensive collection of albums and playing with his new band. But then, one of Quinn’s sister’s friends shows up, and turns out to be a draft dodger. Now Quinn is forced to make some tough choices...and it doesn’t help that his Ouija board is suddenly channeling Jimi Hendrix, Jim Morrison, and Janis Joplin...

For What It’s Worth would be best for boys and girls in fifth grade all the way up to middle school. Readers who know lots of songs, singers, and singing groups from the seventies will appreciate the book to a larger extent than readers who aren’t as familiar with the time period. 

For What It’s Worth is a very interesting story, filled with songs and singers from the seventies. For me, it was hard to understand some parts because of all the musical jargon the author used. If you are willing to look up some names of people and songs, and want to learn something, this book is very good because it includes lots of things that are most likely unknown to the young adult readers of today. Once you get past the music and singers everywhere in the first chapters, For What It’s Worth is a sound novel. The plot was touching and definitely made you want to keep reading, although the characters could have used a bit more development.