How It All Goes Down
Mibs Beaumont and her family live on the border of Kansas and Nebraska. Each family member gets a special power—called a savvy—on their thirteenth birthday, and Mibs's big day is fast approaching. Unfortunately, though, Poppa Beaumont gets into a terrible car accident two days before her birthday and slips into a coma, so Momma and the oldest brother, Rocket, head off to the hospital ninety miles away to look after him.
On the morning of getting her savvy, Mibs is pretty sure she's figured out that she has the power to wake things up, so at her party later on she decides to stow away on a bus going toward the hospital to help Poppa Beaumont come out of his coma. Unluckily for her, though, her older brother Fish (who can control the weather), her quiet younger brother Samson, the older scary girl Bobbi, and the curious boy Will Junior tag along.
Unluckily for Mibs again, the bus ends up going the wrong way from the hospital in Salina, Kansas. And then bad luck strikes a third time when Mibs realizes halfway through the trip that her savvy isn't waking things up—it's hearing people's thoughts when there is ink on their skin, like tattoos.
Despite traveling halfway across Nebraska, picking up a couple more misfits, and accidentally revealing the Beaumont secret to Will and Bobbi (who like them for it anyway), Mibs and the gang eventually make it to the hospital. Even though Mibs isn't able to wake things up, she finds that she does have the ability to talk to her father, and he comes out of the coma.
Phew.