Ten-year-old August Pullman feels ordinary on the inside. But on the outside, Auggie is far from ordinary, and the world won't let him forget it. Born with a myriad of facial abnormalities, Auggie has undergone countless surgeries to help eat and function normally, but none of them have been able to make him look like a normal kid. Wanting to protect Auggie, his parents have homeschooled him his entire life--until now. Auggie is entering the fifth grade, and they think it's time he attends school.

Auggie and the people around him narrate his fifth grade year, as he makes friends and shows his new school that beneath his abnormal features and small stature, he is very much like them.