An exuberant celebration of playing as a team.
Anticipating another happy summer at their (mostly) easygoing, co-ed sports camp, their friends are dismayed that Mack and Andre have chosen rival Camp Killington instead in this third series entry.
Selfless reasons prompted the two to switch to the chilly baseball meritocracy with its country-club ambience. While stellar athletes like Andre are awarded private rooms with hotel amenities; less-stellar campers like Mack are housed in dorms. Hypercompetitive Killington coaches know Andre’s talents, yet opportunities to play are few. Roused at night to mow a croquet pitch, he and Mack wonder if Killington’s resident star, the nephew of an influential Hall of Famer, is responsible. When, without notice, Mack is dispatched to Camp Average, he discovers his cabin’s full, now housing boys from Camp Hortonia who nurse grudges against their hosts. Intracabin friction culminates in an ill-advised bet between Average and Hortonia, to be settled by a game of ball hockey. Average’s far weaker team needs every player—even ball-hockey nonenthusiast Mack. Coached by team captain Cassie, with tech support and camper/videographers Nelson and Wi-Fi on hand to document everything, Mack swallows his humiliation and works on his game. If the plot occasionally strains credulity, the narrative shines when depicting the sports alchemy that transforms diverse young players of varying athletic interests and abilities into a whole greater than the sum of its parts.
An exuberant celebration of playing as a team. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: April 15, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-77147-405-4
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Owlkids Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 25, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often...
A successful juvenile by the beloved New Yorker writer portrays a farm episode with an imaginative twist that makes a poignant, humorous story of a pig, a spider and a little girl.
Young Fern Arable pleads for the life of runt piglet Wilbur and gets her father to sell him to a neighbor, Mr. Zuckerman. Daily, Fern visits the Zuckermans to sit and muse with Wilbur and with the clever pen spider Charlotte, who befriends him when he is lonely and downcast. At the news of Wilbur's forthcoming slaughter, campaigning Charlotte, to the astonishment of people for miles around, spins words in her web. "Some Pig" comes first. Then "Terrific"—then "Radiant". The last word, when Wilbur is about to win a show prize and Charlotte is about to die from building her egg sac, is "Humble". And as the wonderful Charlotte does die, the sadness is tempered by the promise of more spiders next spring.
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often informative as amusing, and the whole tenor of appealing wit and pathos will make fine entertainment for reading aloud, too.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1952
ISBN: 978-0-06-026385-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1952
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
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
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