A sincerely moving story with a whole lotta heart.
Shira Gordon is painfully shy, a wanting-nothing-more-than-to-fade-into-the-background sort of shy.
But a small, vociferous part of her is chomping at the bit, yearning to sing and dance and laugh like no one is watching. When the school music teacher announces the fall musical, The Music Man, Shira lets her best friend, Cassie, coax her into auditioning and even allows herself to dream of getting in. Preferably as a member of the ensemble. Not Mr. Jacey Squires, first tenor of the barbershop quartet—and certainly not understudy to the female lead. But the spirit of the theater is community, and she quickly finds herself drawn into new friendships, budding romances, mysterious sabotage attempts, and a spotlight that might not be as frightening as she once thought. The plot is buoyed by the energy and sincerity of the characters. Asher draws readers so deeply into the drama of these young thespians’ lives that rooting for them is easier than flubbing a line on the first day off-book. Shira’s quirky castmates, teachers, and family are richly individualized, and her retiring, wallflower-esque exterior belies a poignant inner life familiar to any shy middle schooler. Notably, Shira’s shyness is not portrayed as a flaw but as a hurdle the circumstances she’s thrust into force her to overcome. Jewish Shira is presumed White; diversity is naturally woven into the supporting cast.
A sincerely moving story with a whole lotta heart. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: March 16, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4081-7
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
Funny and endearing, though incomplete characterizations provoke questions.
An isolated class of misfits and a teacher on the edge of retirement are paired together for a year of (supposed) failure.
Zachary Kermit, a 55-year-old teacher, has been haunted for the last 27 years by a student cheating scandal that has earned him the derision of his colleagues and killed his teaching spirit. So when he is assigned to teach the Self-Contained Special Eighth-Grade Class—a dumping ground for “the Unteachables,” students with “behavior issues, learning problems, juvenile delinquents”—he is unfazed, as he is only a year away from early retirement. His relationship with his seven students—diverse in temperament, circumstance, and ability—will be one of “uncomfortable roommates” until June. But when Mr. Kermit unexpectedly stands up for a student, the kids of SCS-8 notice his sense of “justice and fairness.” Mr. Kermit finds he may even care a little about them, and they start to care back in their own way, turning a corner and bringing along a few ghosts from Mr. Kermit’s past. Writing in the alternating voices of Mr. Kermit, most of his students, and two administrators, Korman spins a narrative of redemption and belief in exceeding self-expectations. Naming conventions indicate characters of different ethnic backgrounds, but the book subscribes to a white default. The two students who do not narrate may be students of color, and their characterizations subtly—though arguably inadequately—demonstrate the danger of preconceptions.
Funny and endearing, though incomplete characterizations provoke questions. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Jan. 8, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-256388-0
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 16, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2018
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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