Clements serves up a touching, realistic portrait of a shy high-school girl trapped between dueling parents. Erika insists she wants to live with her mother, instead of her too-busy father who loves her but seems to neglect her. Yet Erika’s mother could care less about her daughter, wanting her only for housework. No one but Erika’s court-appointed lawyer seems to care that Erika is struggling to succeed in school and with the intense demands of the leading role in a play. Clements trusts his readers to discern Erika’s true situation, simply by presenting the characters in her life through short scenes. He sometimes shifts the point of view to Jean, the lawyer, for a mature overview of the situation. The result shines through as the portrait of a real girl emerging from a life controlled by others into the beginnings of a life of her own. (Fiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2005
ISBN: 0-374-32304-6
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2005
BOOK REVIEW
An Anglo-Indian boy finds a measure of peace in the landscape of his deceased mother’s childhood, and begins to understand the source of his compulsion to run. The summer after his mother’s death, Kendall is sent to visit his great-grandfather, Armando, a Native American who lives on top of a mesa, in Acoma, or Sky City; it’s a largely abandoned pueblo built centuries ago, overlooking the valley that lies between it and another mesa known as the Enchanted Mesa. Kendall has always been a runner, driven by some inner spirit; he learns from Armando that he is the last in a long line of Acoma runners, men who ran as part of their belief system, and who were especially revered for their bravery and stamina. The mysterious Enchanted Mesa challenges Kendall to run as he never has before, and that kindles his curiosity about his family’s past and his own destiny. He begins to understand the part of his nature that he inherited from his mother, but also realizes that he will never be accepted as a true Acoman because of the Anglo blood that is his legacy from his father. Little has composed a fine coming-of-age story; she enhances it with a lot of insight into a vanishing way of life and the need to preserve it. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: Aug. 8, 1999
ISBN: 0-380-97623-4
Page Count: 147
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1999
“On the basis of their own words” Dudevszky wrote first-person accounts of the sad ordeals of several teenagers who are unable to reside with their families. There are reasons—often a list of reasons—the teenagers no longer live at home, and none of them are good. Marco’s father molested his sisters, Brenda’s parents were addicted to alcohol and drugs, Manuela’s father beat her, and Leyla had to escape from Iran for political reasons. The message that trumpets through is how desperately these youngsters, most living in foster or group homes in the Netherlands, need attention and affection. Jerry, a youth home resident, says, “I don’t get homesick at all. I don’t see my parents that much. They don’t come on my birthday. Well, so they don’t. I’m not going to lose sleep over it.” Maarten, 16, who was moved six times in four years, says, “I often felt lonely. Every time you go to another place you’re all on your own again.” Although the book is worthy, the tone is understandably depressing, and after a while the individual stories lose their bite. Readers who have the pertinacity to get through it will root for Asena and her “number-one wish,” which is “to become happy.” (Nonfiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: Aug. 15, 1999
ISBN: 1-886910-40-5
Page Count: 125
Publisher: Lemniscaat/Boyds Mills
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1999
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