This story of a healing relationship between a traumatized girl and a pony needs some mucking out to make it shine.
An 11-year-old white girl’s bond with a mischievous Shetland pony helps her heal from the trauma of losing her mother.
When Yonder’s mother was killed in an automobile accident four years earlier, her orchard-worker white father started drinking heavily, and Yonder stopped speaking out loud. Now, Yonder locks her father in his bedroom every evening because she is afraid he, too, will disappear from her life, walking out in a drunken haze. Bullied and unable to speak up for herself, Yonder begins skipping school and makes friends with a pudgy Shetland pony she names Dirt. Horrified when Dirt’s owner offers him for sale for horsemeat, Yonder hides the pony in her house. When a social worker sees the state of Yonder’s home life, Yonder is sent to a foster home—and promptly runs away to find Dirt. While the story’s essence works, the delivery lacks polish. Overexplanation and frequent adverbs may exasperate readers who like to figure things out for themselves. Yonder’s first-person narration occasionally strikes a prim middle-aged note (“Every child should experience it. I highly recommend playing hooky”) that rings false, and the use of speaking-themed names (Mutter Street, Bellow Avenue, Trudy Trumpet, Mrs. Prattle) feels forced.
This story of a healing relationship between a traumatized girl and a pony needs some mucking out to make it shine. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: July 25, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-545-92585-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: April 30, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Hugely entertaining, timely, and triumphant.
Robot Roz undertakes an unusual ocean journey to save her adopted island home in this third series entry.
When a poison tide flowing across the ocean threatens their island, Roz works with the resident creatures to ensure that they will have clean water, but the destruction of vegetation and crowding of habitats jeopardize everyone’s survival. Brown’s tale of environmental depredation and turmoil is by turns poignant, graceful, endearing, and inspiring, with his (mostly) gentle robot protagonist at its heart. Though Roz is different from the creatures she lives with or encounters—including her son, Brightbill the goose, and his new mate, Glimmerwing—she makes connections through her versatile communication abilities and her desire to understand and help others. When Roz accidentally discovers that the replacement body given to her by Dr. Molovo is waterproof, she sets out to seek help and discovers the human-engineered source of the toxic tide. Brown’s rich descriptions of undersea landscapes, entertaining conversations between Roz and wild creatures, and concise yet powerful explanations of the effect of the poison tide on the ecology of the island are superb. Simple, spare illustrations offer just enough glimpses of Roz and her surroundings to spark the imagination. The climactic confrontation pits oceangoing mammals, seabirds, fish, and even zooplankton against hardware and technology in a nicely choreographed battle. But it is Roz’s heroism and peacemaking that save the day.
Hugely entertaining, timely, and triumphant. (author’s note) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9780316669412
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
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
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