Overall, a fairly appealing tale of urban friendship.
A middle-grade novel that chronicles the problems a boy and his friend encounter after finding an abandoned baby.
Thirteen-year-old Lionel Perez and his best friend, Anisa Torres, live in Brooklyn. One day, while playfully trespassing in a nearby construction site, the pair discover an abandoned baby in a Porta-Potty. The resulting uproar leads Lionel’s worried mother to force him to take daily piano lessons over the summer from their neighbor, Miss D. However, despite his mother’s precautions, Lionel becomes involved with some neighborhood boys who sell drugs. Though he knows this is a bad idea, Lionel feels it’s the only way he can provide for the baby, whom he plans to kidnap and care for. While Lionel’s far-fetched plans are obviously doomed to fail, readers may wonder at the level of naïveté he exhibits in forming them in the first place. The real challenge comes, though, when Lionel discovers the baby’s mother and must make the hard decision whether to tell or keep this knowledge a secret. Vigilante’s second novel (The Trouble with Half a Moon, 2011) is a quiet story with pacing that sometimes lags and characters whose decisions may leave readers confused. However, its vibrant setting and three-dimensional cast may entice readers who can suspend their disbelief and excuse the many random occurrences.
Overall, a fairly appealing tale of urban friendship. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: March 20, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-399-25160-3
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 14, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A fantastic, heartbreaking crescendo that echoes beyond the final page.
A young Faeran girl puts everything on the line to save her home and the family she loves.
Emerging from the charred ruins of the Faeran forest lair, 13-year-old green-skinned, brown-haired Willa has formed a new family with humans who care about the Great Smoky Mountain as much as she does. Unfortunately, the Sutton Lumber Company has plans to clear the forest for railroad tracks. Her White adoptive father, Nathaniel, has become a leading voice against the destruction, making him a target. After he is arrested on suspicion of murdering loggers, Willa asks for help from her Faeran clan, but they blame her for the death of their leader and subsequent loss of their old home. Even the forest itself has grown hostile as strange, deathly cold creatures attack. Adelaide, a new blond, blue-eyed friend, and Hialeah, Nathaniel’s White and Cherokee daughter, join Willa in protecting the forest, clearing Nathaniel’s name, saving the Faeran, and unraveling the mystery of the malicious beasts. This duology closer is a captivating, stirring tale of family, friendship, the environment, and our place in the world. At every turn, Willa is faced with higher stakes and decisions that are even harder to make; the consequences of each choice weigh on her heart. The gorgeous prose and imagery of the mountains will inspire in readers a deep admiration for nature and support for Willa’s fight.
A fantastic, heartbreaking crescendo that echoes beyond the final page. (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-368-00760-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: April 7, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Twelve-year-old Derek—a notoriously reluctant reader of everything but Calvin and Hobbes—would rather set the grass on fire with his sister’s old sunlamp than tackle his summer reading list. More than that, though, he wants to figure out why his mom’s acting so weird about the ten-year-old article he found from a Martha’s Vineyard newspaper entitled “LOCAL GIRL FOUND DEAD ON BEACH.” That mystery threads throughout this engaging middle-grade novel, told in a dryly hilarious first-person voice. Words like “impulse” and “discipline” are illustrated Pictionary-style by the author’s teenage son, mirroring Derek’s vocabulary-building technique: “My parents insist I use this system all the time, so I usually pretend I’m a spy being tortured by Super Evildoers who force me to practice ‘active reading’ or be killed by a foreign assassin.” When he’s not making avocado grenades, the smart-alecky Derek reveals himself as an endearing softy who loves his friends, family and dog and is even capable, in time, of befriending—horrors!—the class goody-goody. A kinder, gentler Wimpy Kid with all the fun and more plot. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: July 6, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-8050-8903-5
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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