After her father lost his high-paying job, 13-year-old Irene’s parents sold their expensive New York City apartment, withdrew her from her private school and moved in with her grandfather upstate. Her nurseryman grandfather’s calm demeanor and wise advice contrast sharply with her mother’s impatient superficiality, and Irene bonds with him immediately. As her father searches for a job, her mother fails to fully adjust, continuing her immature denial and not quite reining in her abundant spending. Irene, meanwhile, quickly gets over the worst of her disappointment after she meets a large family and makes friends with quiet Meg and her attractive, outgoing older brother, Jim. Their enthusiastic attitude toward life helps Irene accept her changed situation, effectively eliminating a lot of the tension that might have propelled the plot forward. Interesting imagery abounds: After inserting white plant tags into flats of perennials, Irene sadly reflects that “the table before me looked like a miniature graveyard.” Unimportant subplots—a hit-and-run accident and a trip to visit an older half sister—meander into the story without adding significant depth. Yet some characters are richly drawn, and Irene, a likable teen, shows a new maturity as her summer in the country winds down to a mildly surprising conclusion. Quietly soothing and pleasantly entertaining. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: April 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-7613-7303-2
Page Count: 216
Publisher: Carolrhoda Lab
Review Posted Online: April 8, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2011
Well-educated American boys from privileged families have abundant options for college and career. For Chiko, their Burmese counterpart, there are no good choices. There is never enough to eat, and his family lives in constant fear of the military regime that has imprisoned Chiko’s physician father. Soon Chiko is commandeered by the army, trained to hunt down members of the Karenni ethnic minority. Tai, another “recruit,” uses his streetwise survival skills to help them both survive. Meanwhile, Tu Reh, a Karenni youth whose village was torched by the Burmese Army, has been chosen for his first military mission in his people’s resistance movement. How the boys meet and what comes of it is the crux of this multi-voiced novel. While Perkins doesn’t sugarcoat her subject—coming of age in a brutal, fascistic society—this is a gentle story with a lot of heart, suitable for younger readers than the subject matter might suggest. It answers the question, “What is it like to be a child soldier?” clearly, but with hope. (author’s note, historical note) (Fiction. 11-14)
Pub Date: July 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-1-58089-328-2
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Charlesbridge
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2010
Ebulliently original.
Who can't love a story about a Nigerian-American 12-year-old with albinism who discovers latent magical abilities and saves the world?
Sunny lives in Nigeria after spending the first nine years of her life in New York. She can't play soccer with the boys because, as she says, "being albino made the sun my enemy," and she has only enemies at school. When a boy in her class, Orlu, rescues her from a beating, Sunny is drawn in to a magical world she's never known existed. Sunny, it seems, is a Leopard person, one of the magical folk who live in a world mostly populated by ignorant Lambs. Now she spends the day in mundane Lamb school and sneaks out at night to learn magic with her cadre of Leopard friends: a handsome American bad boy, an arrogant girl who is Orlu’s childhood friend and Orlu himself. Though Sunny's initiative is thin—she is pushed into most of her choices by her friends and by Leopard adults—the worldbuilding for Leopard society is stellar, packed with details that will enthrall readers bored with the same old magical worlds. Meanwhile, those looking for a touch of the familiar will find it in Sunny's biggest victories, which are entirely non-magical (the detailed dynamism of Sunny's soccer match is more thrilling than her magical world saving).
Ebulliently original. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: April 14, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-670-01196-4
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: March 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2011
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