An enjoyable and diverse story highlighting friendship, entrepreneurship, and perseverance.
The Startup Squad discovers that selling merch for their favorite rock band is more complicated than it seems.
Harriet Nguyen lives life in the fast lane. She loves creating spectacular outfits every day, adores reptiles, and is the youngest of four siblings. She has three older brothers—Sam, Joe, and Larry—who are also in a band together called the Radical Skinks, named after their favorite reptile. When Harriet accidentally breaks Larry’s guitar and dooms the band, her friends quickly come up with a scheme to keep the band together and help them compete in Battle of the Bands. Together, the four middle schoolers come up with the idea of selling Radical Skinks T-shirts at a concert to raise money for a new guitar. Though the idea seems simple at first, the girls quickly realize they have underestimated how much effort and teamwork it will take to reach their goal, especially with Harriet’s act-first-think-later attitude, which results in disastrous mishaps. Filled with flawed characters and moments of growth, including lessons on trial and error, practicing customer service, and learning from mistakes, this drama-filled, fast-paced, entertaining read places friendship and hard work at its heart. The characters are cued as the following: Harriet and her family are Vietnamese, Amelia is white, Didi is South Asian, and Resa (the focus of series opener The Startup Squad, 2019) is Afro-Latinx. Practical tips on entrepreneurship and a Q&A with a kid entrepreneur appear in the backmatter.
An enjoyable and diverse story highlighting friendship, entrepreneurship, and perseverance. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 5, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-18045-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Imprint
Review Posted Online: March 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and...
Catrina narrates the story of her mixed-race (Latino/white) family’s move from Southern California to Bahía de la Luna on the Northern California coast.
Dad has a new job, but it’s little sister Maya’s lungs that motivate the move: she has had cystic fibrosis since birth—a degenerative breathing condition. Despite her health, Maya loves adventure, even if her lungs suffer for it and even when Cat must follow to keep her safe. When Carlos, a tall, brown, and handsome teen Ghost Tour guide introduces the sisters to the Bahía ghosts—most of whom were Spanish-speaking Mexicans when alive—they fascinate Maya and she them, but the terrified Cat wants only to get herself and Maya back to safety. When the ghost adventure leads to Maya’s hospitalization, Cat blames both herself and Carlos, which makes seeing him at school difficult. As Cat awakens to the meaning of Halloween and Day of the Dead in this strange new home, she comes to understand the importance of the ghosts both to herself and to Maya. Telgemeier neatly balances enough issues that a lesser artist would split them into separate stories and delivers as much delight textually as visually. The backmatter includes snippets from Telgemeier’s sketchbook and a photo of her in Día makeup.
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and unable to put down this compelling tale. (Graphic fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-54061-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
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
BOOK REVIEW
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