Block’s latest can’t decide if it’s allegory, tribute or classical fairy tale.
Is Penelope the last person left alive in the world? The floodwaters that slammed through her Los Angeles neighborhood took her mother, father, brother and even her dog. While she journeys across the ravaged land, myth-loving readers—such as Penelope herself, who reads Ovid for fun and tells her friends stories about “Odysseus, Aeneas, and Achilles”—might notice familiar themes. (Despite the title's nod to García Marquez, the direct Homeric references dominate.) Penelope blinds a one-eyed giant in a chapter called “The Cyclops,” escaping by calling herself “Nobody.” In the Lotus Hotel, she meets addicts high on euphoric juice squeezed from flower petals. The parallels to The Odyssey become even more obvious when Penelope meets a sexy young man in black motorcycle boots whose favorite book is The Odyssey itself and who entertains Penelope by reading from the section of Homer’s epic about the Lotus Eaters. The continuing allusions, sometimes explicitly remarked upon by Penelope and the fellow adventurers she gathers along the way, are unsubtle but not entirely clear. But that may not matter so much: Block’s trademark magical realism works best in a brief, dreamy journey such as this one, even if the destination is uncertain.
Mishmash or no, there’s something encouraging about seeing four queer kids on an epic journey across the post-apocalyptic American Southwest . (Fantasy. 14 & up)Pub Date: Aug. 20, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-8050-9627-9
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano/Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2013
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This story is necessary. This story is important.
23
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Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter is a black girl and an expert at navigating the two worlds she exists in: one at Garden Heights, her black neighborhood, and the other at Williamson Prep, her suburban, mostly white high school.
Walking the line between the two becomes immensely harder when Starr is present at the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend, Khalil, by a white police officer. Khalil was unarmed. Khalil’s death becomes national news, where he’s called a thug and possible drug dealer and gangbanger. His death becomes justified in the eyes of many, including one of Starr’s best friends at school. The police’s lackadaisical attitude sparks anger and then protests in the community, turning it into a war zone. Questions remain about what happened in the moments leading to Khalil’s death, and the only witness is Starr, who must now decide what to say or do, if anything. Thomas cuts to the heart of the matter for Starr and for so many like her, laying bare the systemic racism that undergirds her world, and she does so honestly and inescapably, balancing heartbreak and humor. With smooth but powerful prose delivered in Starr’s natural, emphatic voice, finely nuanced characters, and intricate and realistic relationship dynamics, this novel will have readers rooting for Starr and opening their hearts to her friends and family.
This story is necessary. This story is important. (Fiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-06-249853-3
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 6, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2016
Categories: TEENS & YOUNG ADULT FICTION | TEENS & YOUNG ADULT SOCIAL THEMES
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BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
A slightly abridged graphic version of the classic that will drive off all but the artist’s most inveterate fans.
Admirers of the original should be warned away by veteran horror artist Bernie Wrightson’s introductory comments about Grimly’s “wonderfully sly stylization” and the “twinkle” in his artistic eye. Most general readers will founder on the ensuing floods of tiny faux handwritten script that fill the opening 10 pages of stage-setting correspondence (other lengthy letters throughout are presented in similarly hard-to-read typefaces). The few who reach Victor Frankenstein’s narrative will find it—lightly pruned and, in places, translated into sequences of largely wordless panels—in blocks of varied length interspersed amid sheaves of cramped illustrations with, overall, a sickly, greenish-yellow cast. The latter feature spidery, often skeletal figures that barrel over rough landscapes in rococo, steampunk-style vehicles when not assuming melodramatic poses. Though the rarely seen monster is a properly hard-to-resolve jumble of massive rage and lank hair, Dr. Frankenstein looks like a decayed Lyle Lovett with high cheekbones and an errant, outsized quiff. His doomed bride, Elizabeth, sports a white lock à la Elsa Lanchester, and decorative grotesqueries range from arrangements of bones and skull-faced flowers to bunnies and clownish caricatures.
Grimly plainly worked hard, but, as the title indicates, the result serves his own artistic vision more than Mary Shelley’s. (Graphic classic. 14 & up)Pub Date: Aug. 27, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-186297-7
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 3, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2013
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