An inspiring, filled-to-the-brim adventure; a great example of superpowers done right.
A group of middle school kids learns to use their superpowers in Huerta’s debut novel.
Dr. Lucas McKenna, alongside his partner Dr. Benjamin Price, used to run a genetics lab in Portland, Maine. Together, they worked on the Gray Matter Project, which focused on helping people use more than 10 percent of their brains. Price died in a mysterious plane crash, and McKenna came under suspicion of sabotage, losing his lab funding and career. Ten years later, he’s teaching middle school science in the all-American town of Tempe Ville, Maine. He’s been lucky enough to know and instruct a group of remarkable children gifted with superpowers: Annie (invisibility), GG (super strength), Sophie (healing) and Tommy (telepathy). When a new student named Peter survives a bizarre accident, McKenna realizes he too must have powers. Peter, in fact, can move things with his mind—he only needs practice. While quick to befriend his fellow carriers of what McKenna calls the “alpha gene,” Peter also never backs down from bullies, often causing more harm than good. McKenna decides to shape these supertalented kids into a team that can work together before the shadowy group that’s been stalking him closes in. Huerta, in a fast-paced story laced with sweetness and smarts, reveals the hidden lives of blossoming superheroes. Middle school shenanigans—like shopping at a forbidden candy store or hunting a local ghost—complement scenes in which Peter masters his power. The author frequently offers his heroes, and his young audience, solid real-world advice, like when McKenna tells Peter to “practice his ability and stretch the brain muscle every day.” His female characters, sadly, feel underused. Annie, though featured in an early flashback as the miraculously disappearing baby, slides into the background as Peter’s love interest. Sophie, an introvert, only pops up when someone needs healing. That said, this coming-of-age story is clever enough to delight anyone who picks it up. Occasional grammatical glitches, like the use of “worst” when “worse” is meant, can’t change that.
An inspiring, filled-to-the-brim adventure; a great example of superpowers done right.Pub Date: June 29, 2013
ISBN: 978-0989501408
Page Count: 340
Publisher: Angel M. Huerta
Review Posted Online: Nov. 6, 2013
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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