Elise Gravel is one of my favorite illustrators, but she nails it with this story, too. A young girl hates Saturdays because it's the day of her ballet class, which "is not her thing," because she always ends up kicking, hitting, and bumping into everyone, no matter how hard she tries. Luckily, she runs smack into the teacher at the martial arts school next door, and they realize where her natural interests and inclinations lie: Karate! The cranky ballerina will be cranky no more. Gravel puts the icing on the cake by including, on the last page, a mirror image of her female protagonist, a boy in the karate class whose "thing" appears to be ballet. Hopefully he finds his way to the recently vacated spot in the ballet class next door. Brilliant!

A mismatch between talent, interest and a weekly ballet class leads to frustration for Ada, until she tries something new and finds her true passion. If you enjoy Elise Gravel's cheeky cartoon humour check out her other titles! Slightly older kids who love "gross" facts will want to check out her "disgusting creatures" non-fiction series.

This is a pretty cute book, however, I do not like the repetitive use of the word "hate" for such a young audience.