A fun, amusing tale about the beautiful torment of young hearts and hormones at play.
A poor, persecuted eighth-grade boy falls for a popular girl in a posh school.
Carrillo (Americano Abroad, 2012, etc.) evokes the wonder and confusion of first love in his debut YA novel. The hero is the eponymous Paco Jones, a biracial kid with a good heart but few friends. He’s recently transferred from his old junior high to a preppy private school, and because he’s the most impoverished kid in attendance, he soon finds himself the least popular. It doesn’t help that he sports “a big nose, an unflattering birthmark on my neck, pigeon-toed feet and hairy arms,” all of them fodder for teasing. He’s jeered at during lunch, called Drug Dealer and Paco Taco, and otherwise hounded by “the rumor mill; the gossipers; the two-faced cheaters who’d do anything to get ahead or get popular.” So what hope is there for him when he falls for Naomi Fox, a popular girl already involved with a popular guy? By charm and by chance, Paco becomes friends with both Naomi and her boyfriend, Trent Oden. But that only leads to more problems when Trent drafts Paco to be his Cyrano de Bergerac, choosing gifts for Naomi and writing Trent’s love letters. Carrillo remembers the tortures of eighth grade well and re-creates them with competence. Any reader who’s been young and in love should feel a vicarious thrill when Naomi friends Paco on Facebook or casually shares her number. Readers should also fret for Paco as he gets his hopes up (“If I said the wrong thing it could be over….What could be over?!”). Eight-grade readers should nod in recognition, though a few may find the story arc predictable, at least until a clever twist appears toward the end. Students with different backgrounds from their classmates may especially identify with Paco, an outsider in a strange place, shy but wise, his own heart a secret. But all readers should find plenty here to make them smile.
A fun, amusing tale about the beautiful torment of young hearts and hormones at play.Pub Date: March 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5194-9119-0
Page Count: 126
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 7, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Much like building a bridge stone by stone, this read requires painstaking effort and patience.
Years after the death of their mother, the fourth son in an Australian family of five boys reconnects with his estranged father.
Matthew Dunbar dug up the old TW, the typewriter his father buried (along with a dog and a snake) in the backyard of his childhood home. He searched for it in order to tell the story of the family’s past, a story about his mother, who escaped from Eastern Europe before the fall of the Berlin Wall; about his father, who abandoned them all after their mother’s death; about his brother Clay, who built a bridge to reunite their family; and about a mule named Achilles. Zusak (The Book Thief, 2006, etc.) weaves a complex narrative winding through flashbacks. His prose is thick with metaphor and heavy with allusions to Homer’s epics. The story romanticizes Matthew and his brothers’ often violent and sometimes homophobic expressions of their cisgender, heterosexual masculinity with reflections unsettlingly reminiscent of a “boys will be boys” attitude. Women in the book primarily play the roles of love interests, mothers, or (in the case of their neighbor) someone to marvel at the Dunbar boys and give them jars to open. The characters are all presumably white.
Much like building a bridge stone by stone, this read requires painstaking effort and patience. (Fiction. 16-adult)Pub Date: Oct. 9, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-984830-15-9
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Aug. 5, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
McLaren (Inside the Walls of Troy, 1996, etc.) writes of a girl’s wish to understand her new surroundings, and to be understood by those who love her. When Kate’s father decides to move back to his homeland to work as a lawyer for Hawaiian sovereignty, Kate is devastated at the thought of leaving their comfortable home and affluent lifestyle (not to mention a beloved pet) behind. From the first she hates Oahu and the seedy little apartment the family moves into. Worse, Kate enters school and discovers what it is to be part of a despised minority; she is half Hawaiian, but her fair looks brand her as haole, looked on with contempt at best. Even in her family she experiences rejection; her Hawaiian relatives more or less ignore Kate when they’re not fighting with her father over the means they should use to gain their freedom from the US government. Kate’s past training in ballet comes to her rescue when she learns the hula, the historic interpretive dance that is a major part of Hawaiian culture. To her surprise, her relatives realize that she is not just learning to dance beautifully but is coming to respect their traditions and way of life. It’s a fine story, made even more interesting through its the unflinching look at a place most mainlanders think of as a tropical paradise. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: April 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-689-82393-2
Page Count: 143
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
