by Barbara Dee ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 15, 2020
A carefully crafted blend of realism, age-appropriate sensibilities, and children’s interests.
When her older brother develops bipolar disorder, a seventh grader must cope with its effect on her family.
When Zinnia’s parents get the call that her older brother, Gabriel, has been in a car accident, time, like Gabriel’s new diagnosis of bipolar disorder, seems to take on a life of its own. Chapter headings that mix vague and specific days and times reinforce this notion. Likewise, flashbacks to odd and even scary events with her brother help Zinny see that Gabriel’s condition was not a sudden onset. Although the story focuses on how Zinny deals with this conflict on a personal level, such as retreating from friends, it also explores the effects of mental illness on Zinny’s entire family (who seem to be white). While Gabriel recovers in a treatment center, Zinny’s narration reveals that her mom wants to keep everything secret, her dad’s working longer hours, her older sister feels guilty, and, with attention elsewhere, her younger brother is neglected. There’s no single savior who helps Zinny but instead a string of people and events that work together: a lunchtime therapy group at school (both group and student body are diverse), a school counselor who notes the harm of “crazy” language, scientific experiments that reframe her thinking, forming new friendships and salvaging old ones, and finding humor where she can. The last brings levity to this tough topic.
A carefully crafted blend of realism, age-appropriate sensibilities, and children’s interests. (Fiction. 9-13)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3233-8
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: June 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2020
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by Christina Li ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 12, 2021
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.
An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.
Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
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by Elinor Teele ; illustrated by Ben Whitehouse ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 12, 2016
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish.
The dreary prospect of spending a lifetime making caskets instead of wonderful inventions prompts a young orphan to snatch up his little sister and flee. Where? To the circus, of course.
Fortunately or otherwise, John and 6-year-old Page join up with Boz—sometime human cannonball for the seedy Wandering Wayfarers and a “vertically challenged” trickster with a fantastic gift for sowing chaos. Alas, the budding engineer barely has time to settle in to begin work on an experimental circus wagon powered by chicken poop and dubbed (with questionable forethought) the Autopsy. The hot pursuit of malign and indomitable Great-Aunt Beauregard, the Coggins’ only living relative, forces all three to leave the troupe for further flights and misadventures. Teele spins her adventure around a sturdy protagonist whose love for his little sister is matched only by his fierce desire for something better in life for them both and tucks in an outstanding supporting cast featuring several notably strong-minded, independent women (Page, whose glare “would kill spiders dead,” not least among them). Better yet, in Boz she has created a scene-stealing force of nature, a free spirit who’s never happier than when he’s stirring up mischief. A climactic clutch culminating in a magnificently destructive display of fireworks leaves the Coggin sibs well-positioned for bright futures. (Illustrations not seen.)
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish. (Adventure. 11-13)Pub Date: April 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234510-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Walden Pond Press/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016
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