A Certain Slant of Light

I read that Wiki link in an attempt to grasp why this book appealed to the 1972 Newbery committee (and also apparently the 1970s book reviewers in Horn Book), and I was not surprised to learn that the book has always been a hard sell with actual kids. A lot happens, but there isn't what you might call a plot, and the homeless scenes are too realistic to ping what you might call the "Boxcar Children" centers in the child brain, while also not being gritty enough to appeal to kids who like Grim Reality.