Readers can learn a lot about resilience from this appealingly earnest but humorous hero.
After immigrating to America with her family, a Chinese girl faces big adjustments in this debut middle-grade novel.
Eleven-year-old fifth grader Luolan Xia has a happy life in Shanghai. She has a loving family, which consists of her parents, Mama and Baba; her older brother, Lizhong (in sixth grade); and her 2-year-old brother, Ming Ming. She also enjoys school (even tests) and has a great best friend in Haiqing Xu. So when her parents announce that they’re moving to the United States, Luolan is shocked at the news and sad to leave Haiqing behind. The journey to Massachusetts is long and full of new experiences, not always pleasant. But on the flight, Luolan does meet Olivia Deacon, a friendly girl her age who just happens to be her new next-door neighbor; they’ll both be attending Andrew Jackson Middle School. On her first night in America, Luolan writes a list of four goals to accomplish: “1. Make three new friends. 2. Learn English. 3. Get people to like me. 4. Find a reason to call America ‘home.’ ” Obstacles include a mean girl, racist remarks, and old friend/new friend jealousy, but Luolan persists. A middle schooler herself, Shao delivers an accomplished tale, offering a voice that’s authentic and amusing. Commenting on an amusement park ride, for example, Luolan notes: “The Skydive Dragon was not very skydive-y.” Some coincidences are highly unlikely, and a bully’s newly displayed self-awareness is awfully sudden, but these flaws are outweighed by the book’s strengths. For instance, the author nails tween friend drama, often played out via text, and demonstrates the growing responsibilities of middle schoolers, including figuring out a class project.
Readers can learn a lot about resilience from this appealingly earnest but humorous hero.Pub Date: Dec. 17, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-951742-48-5
Page Count: 186
Publisher: Mulberry Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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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