A poignant, beautiful story of family, endurance, and appreciation.
A young Mexican immigrant tells the story of his family and the lives of other migrant farm workers in this graphic novel adaptation of a classic 1997 memoir that won multiple awards.
Panchito, whose family left the Guadalajara area and crossed la frontera in the late 1940s, is growing up with his parents and five siblings. As the seasons pass, they move around California—Selma, Visalia, Bakersfield, Corcoran, and Santa Maria, among other places—finding work picking different crops. Panchito’s story unfolds in chronologically arranged, self-contained short stories, and readers follow the family through their circuit, from picking cotton and strawberries to topping carrots and thinning lettuce. They experience significant sorrows, such as when baby Torito ends up near death due to a lack of health care. The narrative doesn’t dwell on these moments, instead sharing the truth of hardship: that even where there’s sadness, there’s also joy to be found. Panchito’s time with older brother Roberto, the advice he receives from his mamá, and little moments with his friends allow readers to experience life’s simple pleasures alongside the family’s struggles. The exquisite illustrations are warm and weathered, perfectly complementing the emotional storytelling and evoking the mid-20th-century setting. Each person introduced serves a purpose, adding greater insights into Panchito’s life, and carefully relayed sensory details and seamlessly integrated Spanish words pull readers into the setting. The touching author’s note helps frame the memoir and its significance.
A poignant, beautiful story of family, endurance, and appreciation. (glossary) (Graphic memoir. 8-12)Pub Date: March 26, 2024
ISBN: 9780358348214
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 16, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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