by Norma Fox Mazer ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 31, 2001
Love and loss, learning to heal after profound sorrow, and finding redemption in family ties are the themes of this well-done effort from Mazer (Good Night, Maman, 1999, etc.). From the haunting first sentence, readers will be captivated by the plight of 13-year-old Sarabeth Silver, who suffers the premature death of her barely 30-year-old mother from a heart attack. Sarabeth, now an orphan (her father died in an accident years before), is taken in by her mother’s best friend and the woman’s husband. Though these people mean well, the living arrangement proves very unsatisfactory. Sorting through some of her mother’s belongings one day, Sarabeth happens upon a telephone book that contains the names of people she’s never heard of. She discovers that these are the names of relatives her mother never contacted or spoke about. Sarabeth has always believed that her mother’s family callously turned their backs on her and her parents, a repudiation occasioned by the couple’s teenage marriage. With the encouragement of very close and caring friends—including a boy on whom Sarabeth has a crush—she musters the courage to travel to her mother’s hometown and become acquainted with her long-lost family. Not only does she discover that there’s no ill will on their part toward her or her parents, but she also learns some other startling truths that reveal her mother in a new light. Sarabeth is herself a well-limned character; she’s very real, though her friends and some other characters come across as too good to be true and the boy she likes is almost too perfect. Still, it’s a fine, sometimes funny, unsentimental read with an ending that will satisfy. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: May 31, 2001
ISBN: 0-688-13350-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2001
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by Norma Fox Mazer & illustrated by Christine Davenier
by Karen Cushman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 14, 2006
It’s 1949, and 13-year-old Francine Green lives in “the land of ‘Sit down, Francine’ and ‘Be quiet, Francine’ ” at All Saints School for Girls in Los Angeles. When she meets Sophie Bowman and her father, she’s encouraged to think about issues in the news: the atomic bomb, peace, communism and blacklisting. This is not a story about the McCarthy era so much as one about how one girl—who has been trained to be quiet and obedient by her school, family, church and culture—learns to speak up for herself. Cushman offers a fine sense of the times with such cultural references as President Truman, Hopalong Cassidy, Montgomery Clift, Lucky Strike, “duck and cover” and the Iron Curtain. The dialogue is sharp, carrying a good part of this story of friends and foes, guilt and courage—a story that ought to send readers off to find out more about McCarthy, his witch-hunt and the First Amendment. Though not a happily-ever-after tale, it dramatizes how one person can stand up to unfairness, be it in front of Senate hearings or in the classroom. (author’s note) (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: Aug. 14, 2006
ISBN: 0-618-50455-9
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2006
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by Marina Budhos ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 2006
Illegal immigrant sisters learn a lot about themselves when their family faces deportation in this compelling contemporary drama. Immigrants from Bangladesh, Nadira, her older sister Aisha and their parents live in New York City with expired visas. Fourteen-year-old Nadira describes herself as “the slow-wit second-born” who follows Aisha, the family star who’s on track for class valedictorian and a top-rate college. Everything changes when post-9/11 government crack-downs on Muslim immigrants push the family to seek asylum in Canada where they are turned away at the border and their father is arrested by U.S. immigration. The sisters return to New York living in constant fear of detection and trying to pretend everything is normal. As months pass, Aisha falls apart while Nadira uses her head in “a right way” to save her father and her family. Nadira’s need for acceptance by her family neatly parallels the family’s desire for acceptance in their adopted country. A perceptive peek into the lives of foreigners on the fringe. (endnote) (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2006
ISBN: 1-4169-0351-8
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Ginee Seo/Atheneum
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2005
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