A heartfelt tale that intertwines a young boy’s personal journey with his love of nature.
A boy’s summer takes an unexpected turn, leading him to discover a new passion.
Cooper Garnett, who’s almost 12, is planning to have the best summer ever, playing basketball and learning to golf with his grandfather. But his hopes are dashed after he falls out of a tree while trying to touch the eggs in a mockingbird nest, breaking his arm and giving himself a concussion. While recuperating, he spends time at his grandparents’ house. As Coop, his grandparents, and his friend Zandi watch the hatchlings venture out of the nest, they notice that one is different—it has only one wing. After Coop and Zandi learn that the little mockingbird likely won’t survive to adulthood on its own, they decide to rescue it and keep it safe. Through caring for the bird, named Hop, Coop comes to realize that loving someone sometimes means making hard choices. Woods uses simple, conversational language to bring the briskly paced story to life. Drawing parallels between Coop’s complicated emotions around his adoption and his feelings toward the rescued bird, she makes a complex topic feel accessible while also illustrating what it truly means to love and protect. Though Coop and his grandfather are well developed, other characters fall a bit flat. The use of names and language cue characters as Black.
A heartfelt tale that intertwines a young boy’s personal journey with his love of nature. (Fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2024
ISBN: 9780593461532
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
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
BOOK REVIEW
Dolphin lovers will appreciate this look at our complicated relationship with these marine mammals.
Is dolphin-assisted therapy so beneficial to patients that it’s worth keeping a wild dolphin captive?
Twelve-year-old Lily has lived with her emotionally distant oncologist stepfather and a succession of nannies since her mother died in a car accident two years ago. Nannies leave because of the difficulty of caring for Adam, Lily’s severely autistic 4-year-old half brother. The newest, Suzanne, seems promising, but Lily is tired of feeling like a planet orbiting the sun Adam. When she meets blind Zoe, who will attend the same private middle school as Lily in the fall, Lily’s happy to have a friend. However, Zoe’s take on the plight of the captive dolphin, Nori, used in Adam’s therapy opens Lily’s eyes. She knows she must use her influence over her stepfather, who is consulting on Nori’s treatment for cancer (caused by an oil spill), to free the animal. Lily’s got several fine lines to walk, as she works to hold onto her new friend, convince her stepfather of the rightness of releasing Nori, and do what’s best for Adam. In her newest exploration of animal-human relationships, Rorby’s lonely, mature heroine faces tough but realistic situations. Siblings of children on the spectrum will identify with Lily. If the tale flirts with sentimentality and some of the characters are strident in their views, the whole never feels maudlin or didactic.
Dolphin lovers will appreciate this look at our complicated relationship with these marine mammals. (Fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: May 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-545-67605-2
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2015
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