by Bernadette Crepeau ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 23, 2016
Readers will be charmed by both the characters and scenery in this moral, upbeat YA fantasy.
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Crepeau (Turn Back Time, 2014, etc.) offers a YA fantasy in which a teenage orphan inherits property in Ireland and stumbles into a war that threatens the fae kingdom.
Sixteen-year-old Bridget Kerins lives alone in a shabby apartment in the Red Hook neighborhood of Brooklyn. She works two jobs, both of her parents have passed away, and her neighbor Mrs. Miller vouches for her as an “aunt” to the authorities. Miraculously, Bridget learns from Ana Gurney, an Irish lawyer, that she’s inherited land near the Irish village of Swinford. Using money she’s saved, Bridget crosses the Atlantic in the hope of starting a new life. The situation changes, however, when Ana is mistaken for Bridget on the road to the property; a foul creature named Dagda, who works for the evil sorceress Morrigan, kidnaps the lawyer, believing her to be the one prophesied to save the fae peoples. Bridget safely rents a car at the airport and makes her way toward Swinford. She meets Aunt Polly, a brownie, and is indoctrinated into the fae world—and the notion that she has special powers, due to faerie and leprechaun ancestry. But even with the help of the handsome Lord Howth, who’s disguised as a Brittany spaniel, can Bridget master her abilities in time to save Ana and the fae? Author Crepeau begins a new YA fantasy series featuring a vibrant cast of mythological characters and a deep appreciation for the majesty of Ireland. The lousiness of Bridget’s Red Hook life is hammered home in lines such as, “she washes the stairs with buckets of bleach water, but nothing removes the odor of urine and stale beer.” (High school for this teenager isn’t even mentioned.) Later, in Ireland and eventually Scotland, the “green hilly pastures that go on for miles” enchant her, as do ruins and ancient castles. When Morrigan’s machinations begin, readers meet creatures such as the strange Anthropophagi (“a headless creature appears, his eyes placed on his shoulders, and his mouth is in the center of his chest. He has no nose”) but also heroic fae royalty, including King Padraig and Queen Geraldine and even a few Arthurian legends. Bridget learns much about herself by the end, including that “Sometimes it is easier...to believe in things outside ourselves, rather than believe in ourselves.”
Pub Date: April 23, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5188-9830-3
Page Count: 214
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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by Adam Eli ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 2, 2020
Small but mighty necessary reading.
A miniature manifesto for radical queer acceptance that weaves together the personal and political.
Eli, a cis gay white Jewish man, uses his own identities and experiences to frame and acknowledge his perspective. In the prologue, Eli compares the global Jewish community to the global queer community, noting, “We don’t always get it right, but the importance of showing up for other Jews has been carved into the DNA of what it means to be Jewish. It is my dream that queer people develop the same ideology—what I like to call a Global Queer Conscience.” He details his own isolating experiences as a queer adolescent in an Orthodox Jewish community and reflects on how he and so many others would have benefitted from a robust and supportive queer community. The rest of the book outlines 10 principles based on the belief that an expectation of mutual care and concern across various other dimensions of identity can be integrated into queer community values. Eli’s prose is clear, straightforward, and powerful. While he makes some choices that may be divisive—for example, using the initialism LGBTQIAA+ which includes “ally”—he always makes clear those are his personal choices and that the language is ever evolving.
Small but mighty necessary reading. (resources) (Nonfiction. 14-18)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-09368-9
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2020
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by Alok Vaid-Menon ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 2, 2020
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change.
Artist and activist Vaid-Menon demonstrates how the normativity of the gender binary represses creativity and inflicts physical and emotional violence.
The author, whose parents emigrated from India, writes about how enforcement of the gender binary begins before birth and affects people in all stages of life, with people of color being especially vulnerable due to Western conceptions of gender as binary. Gender assignments create a narrative for how a person should behave, what they are allowed to like or wear, and how they express themself. Punishment of nonconformity leads to an inseparable link between gender and shame. Vaid-Menon challenges familiar arguments against gender nonconformity, breaking them down into four categories—dismissal, inconvenience, biology, and the slippery slope (fear of the consequences of acceptance). Headers in bold font create an accessible navigation experience from one analysis to the next. The prose maintains a conversational tone that feels as intimate and vulnerable as talking with a best friend. At the same time, the author's turns of phrase in moments of deep insight ring with precision and poetry. In one reflection, they write, “the most lethal part of the human body is not the fist; it is the eye. What people see and how people see it has everything to do with power.” While this short essay speaks honestly of pain and injustice, it concludes with encouragement and an invitation into a future that celebrates transformation.
A fierce, penetrating, and empowering call for change. (writing prompt) (Nonfiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: June 2, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-09465-5
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
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More In The Series
by Shavone Charles ; illustrated by Ashley Lukashevsky
by Leo Baker ; illustrated by Ashley Lukashevsky
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