A compassionate window into the awkward and isolating stages of growing up.
A socially struggling sixth grader finds herself in the unlikely position of providing counsel to others.
After Desdemona Hillman Diller learned that she and her best friend, Juniper, were going to be in different classes, her mom tried to sell it as an opportunity to make new friends. But Dee always felt that Juniper was enough. A subject of mean gossip, Dee now spends her Snack and Stretch breaks hiding in the bathroom. After an unfortunate Parent PE Day during which her mother deeply embarrasses her, Dee flees to the bathroom, where she hears clanging through a vent that connects to the boys’ bathroom. Her classmate Harry, who’s upset about something his father did, is next door, kicking the grate. After Dee consoles Harry, he asks if they can meet again the next day. Only it isn’t Harry who shows up, but a distressed second grader from the elementary school one floor down who was cruelly teased for a spelling mistake. Soon, Dee is giving advice to schoolmates both younger and older—even as Juniper moves on to new friends, who are unkind to Dee. Debut author Thayer skillfully and authentically captures the often-painful social transitions of middle school. In a satisfying growth arc, quiet, kind Dee comes out of her shell, realizing she’s worth more than the judgments of others made her believe. Main characters are cued white.
A compassionate window into the awkward and isolating stages of growing up. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Nov. 12, 2024
ISBN: 9781665955249
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2024
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious.
If you made a recording to be heard by the aliens who found the iPod, what would you record?
For 11-year-old Alex Petroski, it's easy. He records everything. He records the story of how he travels to New Mexico to a rocket festival with his dog, Carl Sagan, and his rocket. He records finding out that a man with the same name and birthday as his dead father has an address in Las Vegas. He records eating at Johnny Rockets for the first time with his new friends, who are giving him a ride to find his dead father (who might not be dead!), and losing Carl Sagan in the wilds of Las Vegas, and discovering he has a half sister. He even records his own awful accident. Cheng delivers a sweet, soulful debut novel with a brilliant, refreshing structure. His characters manage to come alive through the “transcript” of Alex’s iPod recording, an odd medium that sounds like it would be confusing but really works. Taking inspiration from the Voyager Golden Record released to space in 1977, Alex, who explains he has “light brown skin,” records all the important moments of a journey that takes him from a family of two to a family of plenty.
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-18637-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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