Gripping gaming action alongside compassionate explorations of mental health concerns.
A shy, talented gamer develops new friendships while navigating the effects of his mother’s bipolar disorder.
Being on Lawsondale Middle School’s esports team has been great for Josh Bard, who prefers to go by his last name only and has a lot of worries. Bard has a hard time opening up to people, but on the advice of wise school psychologist Mrs. Beckett, he’s trying to work on his friendships. An influx of new teammates plus several new schools joining their league is a lot to process, even without the fact that his former bully, Dmitri Xanthopoulos, is now on the Gamers team too. Bard’s mother is experiencing struggles related to her bipolar disorder, which means that someone needs to be with her all the time, a task that sometimes falls to Bard despite his after-school Gamers meetings. As the team prepares for a winter esports tournament, Bard’s old and new friendships deepen even as both his resiliency and gaming skills are put to the test. This second entry in the Gamers series builds on relationships formed in the first book but works well as a stand-alone, too. As in the series opener, the storyline is particularly well-balanced between active gaming sessions and heavier moments of emotional resonance. Bard wears hearing aids, uses “all pronouns,” and reads white; there’s abundant diversity among his teammates.
Gripping gaming action alongside compassionate explorations of mental health concerns. (author’s note) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: June 30, 2026
ISBN: 9781645952824
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Pixel+Ink
Review Posted Online: June 1, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2026
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
A successful call for creating and imagining, even if the story itself falls short.
In the dystopian, totalitarian world of 2099, 14-year-old Tessa and her family are desperate to solve the mystery of her twin brother Theo’s disappearance.
Tessa is growing up in a time when playgrounds are historical relics, surveillance cameras are everywhere, music is outlawed, and owning books is illegal. Under the absolute rule of Zokiris, the decadeslong leader of her territory, people are heavily controlled. When Theo vanishes under mysterious circumstances and his name is erased from the Territory Statistics list, Tessa’s 135-year-old neighbor, Miriam, gives the family contraband books that become central to figuring out Theo’s whereabouts. Most books have long since been seized and stored away in Building 903; Tessa is intrigued by their presence in her home, while her mother is terrified. Lowry, the acclaimed, award-winning author of The Giver (1993), shines in her creation of uncomfortably believable dystopian societies. Tessa’s painfully limited world is fully imagined, with its own history, laws, and norms. Her relationship with her brother reads as realistic and tender and is crucial to the mystery. Miriam is the most strongly developed character: wise and independent, unafraid and hopeful. While the climb to the book’s climax is captivating, the hurried resolution is disappointing. The powerful messaging around the importance of literature and imagination certainly resonates, however. The main characters present white.
A successful call for creating and imagining, even if the story itself falls short. (Dystopian. 9-12)Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2026
ISBN: 9780063515109
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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