A promising plot that plays Indian; readers looking for #ownvoices should paddle their pumpkins on.
A 12-year-old girl hopes to turn last year’s pumpkin-boat–race loss into a win, but revenge might ruin a friendship forever.
Billie and Sam’s friendship ended last summer when Sam beat her in Madeline Island’s annual pumpkin race. According to Billie, Sam cheated, and this summer he’ll pay. From pumpkin planting to race-day harvest, Billie’s bitterness grows. First she refuses to accept his help, then she ignores him completely. Billie’s grandmother admonishes her for this shameful behavior, but it takes a more serious event to lift Billie to forgiveness. The plot offers an appealing premise, and the story’s division into four summer-month sections makes for a quick read. Unfortunately, the cultural milieu comes across as unrooted. Billie’s “half Ojibwe from [her] mom’s side” with “red hair and green eyes” from her father’s Irish side, which is completely believable, and some Ojibwe words (italicized) and cultural touches are included. However, such phrases as “running wild” and “wild dancing” read as woefully unaware, and attempts at cultural scenes either surface skim in a manner reminiscent of diversity box-checking or are described through a naïve awe that reads as a white gaze. Additionally, attributing the Blackfoot word “Sinopa” as an Ojibwe name and incorrectly writing that “nitsidigo’i” is an Ojibwe word for “kneeldown bread” when both the word and the bread are Diné (a culturally and linguistically unrelated people 1,600-plus miles away) amplify readers’ sense of the author’s unfamiliarity with Native peoples.
A promising plot that plays Indian; readers looking for #ownvoices should paddle their pumpkins on. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 21, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5247-6733-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Wendy Lamb/Random
Review Posted Online: March 16, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2019
A beautifully rendered setting enfolds a disappointing plot.
In sixth grade, Izzy Mancini’s cozy, loving world falls apart.
She and her family have moved out of the cottage she grew up in. Her mother has spent the summer on Block Island instead of at home with Izzy. Her father has recently returned from military service in Afghanistan partially paralyzed and traumatized. The only people she can count on are Zelda and Piper, her best friends since kindergarten—that is, until the Haidary family moves into the upstairs apartment. At first, Izzy resents the new guests from Afghanistan even though she knows she should be grateful that Dr. Haidary saved her father’s life. But despite her initial resistance (which manifests at times as racism), as Izzy gets to know Sitara, the Haidarys’ daughter, she starts to question whether Zelda and Piper really are her friends for forever—and whether she has the courage to stand up for Sitara against the people she loves. Ferruolo weaves a rich setting, fully immersing readers in the largely white, coastal town of Seabury, Rhode Island. Disappointingly, the story resolves when Izzy convinces her classmates to accept Sitara by revealing the Haidarys’ past as American allies, a position that put them in so much danger that they had to leave home. The idea that Sitara should be embraced only because her family supported America, rather than simply because she is a human being, significantly undermines the purported message of tolerance for all.
A beautifully rendered setting enfolds a disappointing plot. (Fiction. 10-12)Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-374-30909-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A smart, fresh take on an old favorite makes for a terrific series kickoff
A modern Sherlock Holmes retelling brings an 11-year-old black John Watson into the sphere of know-it-all 9-year-old white detective Shelby Holmes.
John's an Army brat who's lived in four states already. Now, with his parents' divorce still fresh, the boy who's lived only on military bases must explore the wilds of Harlem. His new life in 221A Baker St. begins inauspiciously, as before he's even finished moving in, his frizzy-haired neighbor blows something up: "BOOM!" But John's great at making friends, and Shelby certainly seems like an interesting kid to know. Oddly loquacious, brusque, and extremely observant, Shelby's locally famous for solving mysteries. John’s swept up in her detecting when a wealthy, brown-skinned classmate enlists their help in the mysterious disappearance of her beloved show dog, Daisy. Whatever could have happened to the prizewinning Cavalier King Charles spaniel? Has she been swiped by a jealous competitor? Has Daisy’s trainer—mysteriously come into enough money to take a secret weekend in Cozumel—been placing bets against his own dog? Brisk pacing, likable characters, a few silly Holmes jokes ("I'm Petunia Cumberbatch," says Shelby while undercover), and a diverse neighborhood, carefully and realistically described by John, are ingredients for success.
A smart, fresh take on an old favorite makes for a terrific series kickoff . (Mystery. 9-11)Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-68119-051-8
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2016
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