What's all the fuss about? At first, Maggie is just being contrary when she tells her parents she doesn't need to learn cursive. Then her teacher, Mrs. Leeper, says Maggie's cursive is so untidy her name looks like "Muggie," and Maggie decides she will never, never read or write cursive. Nobody can make her. But, when Mrs. Leeper appoints Maggie class mail messenger, the notes Maggie must carry are in cursive. Maggie can't read the notes, but she suspects some of them are about her. Now she really has a problem!
Maggie resists learning cursive writing in the third grade, until she discovers that knowing how to read and write cursive promises to open up an entirely new world of knowledge for her.