Mama checks into a mental hospital after one of her occasional spells turns into something deeper. It’s two years after the accident that killed her son and changed the family forever. His sister, 13-year-old tomboy Buddy, cannot understand why her family will not discuss the situation or their feelings, but does recognize the embarrassment they may face if their 1960s small town finds out. Buddy’s exciting summer before her first year of high school turns into dealing with her mother’s “selfishness” and inability to heal immediately, her father’s lack of emotion, and her boy-crazy friend Ginger’s attempt to make her over with makeup and padded bras. Borrowing from her grandmother’s patience; her free-spirited, caring, young aunt who becomes a live-in big sister; and another friend, Verna, whose poverty, polio-stricken mother, and unconventional father draw ridicule throughout town, Buddy learns that everyone has their idiosyncrasies. Her father is sensitive and dedicated to the family; community is about helping, not rejecting, members in need; and a crush may lead to potential romance. Most of all, Buddy succeeds in coming to terms with her true feelings about her “perfect” big brother, letting her mother—and herself—take on life one day at a time, and realizing that mourning is not forgetting, but keeping memories alive. While first-time author Fritz marks the time period with references to lunch-counter sit-ins, soda fountains, and Elvis Presley, she also shows that the need for friends and family remains timeless. Although the ending, a little too neat and tidy, also arrives too quickly, readers will be drawn to Buddy’s frankness and compassion and how one family copes with problems that continue today. (Fiction. 11-14)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-7868-0790-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Hyperion
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2002
BOOK REVIEW
When Clara Luna, 14, visits rural Mexico for the summer to visit the paternal grandparents she has never met, she cannot know her trip will involve an emotional and spiritual journey into her family’s past and a deep connection to a rich heritage of which she was barely aware. Long estranged from his parents, Clara’s father had entered the U.S. illegally years before, subsequently becoming a successful business owner who never spoke about what he left behind. Clara’s journey into her grandmother’s history (told in alternating chapters with Clara’s own first-person narrative) and her discovery that she, like her grandmother and ancestors, has a gift for healing, awakens her to the simple, mystical joys of a rural lifestyle she comes to love and wholly embrace. Painfully aware of not fitting into suburban teen life in her native Maryland, Clara awakens to feeling alive in Mexico and realizes a sweet first love with Pedro, a charming goat herder. Beautifully written, this is filled with evocative language that is rich in imagery and nuance and speaks to the connections that bind us all. Add a thrilling adventure and all the makings of an entrancing read are here. (glossaries) (Fiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2006
ISBN: 0-385-73343-7
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2006
It’s the haunting details of those around Kai that readers will remember.
Kai’s life is upended when his coastal village is devastated in Japan’s 2011 earthquake and tsunami in this verse novel from an author who experienced them firsthand.
With his single mother, her parents, and his friend Ryu among the thousands missing or dead, biracial Kai, 17, is dazed and disoriented. His friend Shin’s supportive, but his intact family reminds Kai, whose American dad has been out of touch for years, of his loss. Kai’s isolation is amplified by his uncertain cultural status. Playing soccer and his growing friendship with shy Keiko barely lessen his despair. Then he’s invited to join a group of Japanese teens traveling to New York to meet others who as teenagers lost parents in the 9/11 attacks a decade earlier. Though at first reluctant, Kai agrees to go and, in the process, begins to imagine a future. Like graphic novels, today’s spare novels in verse (the subgenre concerning disasters especially) are significantly shaped by what’s left out. Lacking art’s visceral power to grab attention, verse novels may—as here—feel sparsely plotted with underdeveloped characters portrayed from a distance in elegiac monotone. Kai’s a generic figure, a coat hanger for the disaster’s main event, his victories mostly unearned; in striking contrast, his rural Japanese community and how they endure catastrophe and overwhelming losses—what they do and don’t do for one another, comforts they miss, kindnesses they value—spring to life.
It’s the haunting details of those around Kai that readers will remember. (author preface, afterword) (Verse fiction. 12-14)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-553-53474-0
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Sept. 15, 2015
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