Fast-paced and occasionally silly, with just the right amount of heart.
A middle-child yearns to be a football star in Alipio’s middle-grade novel.
Twelve-year-old Hatcher “Hatch” Elvis Hampton is the second of three children in a family led by a single mother in Louisiana. His younger brother, Harper, is “given the nickname tonsils because he’s a four-year old pain in [Hatch’s] neck,” and his older brother, Hunter, is varsity captain of the football team and First Team All-State. They are joined by their cousin Heatha, who comes to stay with them while dealing with some family problems of her own. They live a somewhat old-fashioned lifestyle, with no video games or iPads or Netflix, so Hatch spends his time making up football plays in his head with the goal of becoming a gridiron star like his older brother. It’s his number one ambition in life: “What’s not to like about football? The crisp air. The fresh cut grass. The roar of the crowd. Not to mention maybe one day I’ll create a football play that people will talk about forever.” The problem is, he’s just not very big or confident, and he struggles to find his footing when trying out for the school team. This haplessness extends to his school life in general—he tries to ingratiate himself with the sporty kids at lunch but instead trips and spills his food all over the school library. Hatch does eventually earn a spot on the B-Team, which has a new coach: Heatha’s estranged father. What begins as farce broadens to include more serious considerations of family, belonging, and trying to find hope in difficult circumstances. Alipio keeps the narrative buoyant with jokes and a light tone, but he is able to deftly explore more challenging issues as he digs into Hatch and Heatha’s deeper motivations. The text is divided into short chapters (rarely longer than five pages) and supplemented by occasional black-and-white illustrations by Melina Alipio, helping to make the novel a fun and engaging read for football fans and realistic fiction fans alike.
Fast-paced and occasionally silly, with just the right amount of heart.Pub Date: July 15, 2025
ISBN: 9781455628469
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Pelican Publishing Company
Review Posted Online: July 30, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An absorbing fantasy centered on a resilient female protagonist facing growth, change, and self-empowerment.
In Florence’s middle-grade fantasy novel, a young girl’s heart is tested in the face of an evil, spreading Darkness.
Eleven-year-old Lydia, “freckle-cheeked and round-eyed, with hair the color of pine bark and fair skin,” is struggling with the knowledge that she has reached the age to apprentice as an herbalist. Lydia is reluctant to leave her beloved, magical Mulberry Glen and her cozy Housetree in the woods—she’ll miss Garder, the Glen’s respected philosopher; her fairy guardian Pit; her human friend Livy; and even the mischievous part-elf, part-imp, part-human twins Zale and Zamilla. But the twins go missing after hearing of a soul-sapping Darkness that has swallowed a forest and is creeping into minds and engulfing entire towns. They have secretly left to find a rare fruit that, it is said, will stop the Darkness if thrown into the heart of the mountain that rises out of the lethal forest. Lydia follows, determined to find the twins before they, too, fall victim to the Darkness. During her journey, accompanied by new friends, she gradually realizes that she herself has a dangerous role to play in the quest to stop the Darkness. In this well-crafted fantasy, Florence skillfully equates the physical manifestation of Darkness with the feelings of insecurity and powerlessness that Lydia first struggles with when thinking of leaving the Glen. Such negative thoughts grow more intrusive the closer she and her friends come to the Darkness—and to Lydia’s ultimate, powerfully rendered test of character, which leads to a satisfyingly realistic, not quite happily-ever-after ending. Highlights include a delightfully haunting, reality-shifting library and a deft sprinkling of Latin throughout the text; Pit’s pet name for Lydia is mea flosculus (“my little flower”). Fine-lined ink drawings introducing each chapter add a pleasing visual element to this well-grounded fairy tale.
An absorbing fantasy centered on a resilient female protagonist facing growth, change, and self-empowerment.Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781956393095
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Waxwing Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A page-turner for soccer-mad readers, whether fans or players.
Challenges on and off the field await a 12-year-old Ohio boy who’s unexpectedly invited to attend an exclusive soccer camp in England.
Leo K. Doyle may be a star forward on his YMCA league team, but after accepting a surprising invitation from a roving scout to attend a month of highly competitive tryouts for a Premier League youth development program, he finds himself far from home and, at best, in the middle of the pack. At the London Dragons camp, Leo, who’s cued as biracial, with a white dad and brown-skinned mom, makes friends with fellow players from around the world. He also wins an anti-American bully’s grudging respect and even helps his 19-year-old coach with a sweet gesture of apology for his girlfriend. But from the outset, the focus is on “the Beautiful Game.” Without letting up on the breathless pace for a moment, Layton packs Leo’s narrative with clear descriptions of skills and techniques both basic and advanced, sapient coaching, game strategies, and intangibles (such as team chemistry) that ultimately come together to set Leo apart from his bigger, faster, stronger rivals. Following a series of hard-fought elimination matches culminating in a high-stakes final in the big stadium under the eyes of the godlike professional team, Leo flies home in time for a dizzying final twist that sets up the sequel to this first entry in Layton’s popular British series.
A page-turner for soccer-mad readers, whether fans or players. (Fiction. 8-13)Pub Date: Sept. 2, 2025
ISBN: 9781464267109
Page Count: 306
Publisher: Sourcebooks Young Readers
Review Posted Online: June 13, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
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