Heartwarming and hopeful—readers will treasure this story of family and resilience.
A young girl discovers that sometimes the things we need most find us first.
Middle schooler Cordy, short for Cordelia, feels as though she’s carrying an invisible backpack filled with sand—the weight of grief, two years and four months after losing her fisherman father to “The Accident.” Cordy desperately seeks signs of good luck while trying to hold her fractured family together. Then a hungry, foul-breathed stray follows her home to her family’s rental, an old, leaky boathouse on the Oregon coast. She names the pooch Lost; the dog’s dental issues introduce the family to Pakistani American Taj, a veterinarian whose kindness extends far beyond animal care. Sloan populates her story with well-realized adult characters who genuinely show up for children, among them a heavy metal–loving librarian who gifts Cordy a backpack and elderly Mrs. Crowley with her vintage Polaroid camera. The Oregon setting isn’t mere backdrop; Cordy’s fascination with marine life, from molting crabs to a rare pink dolphin, is woven seamlessly into her emotional journey. While there’s “always a chance of rain” both literally and figuratively, Sloan’s gentle wisdom shines through: “So much stuff is how you choose to see it.” Young people will recognize Cordy’s fierce protectiveness and her struggle with change, even if they’ve never experienced a life-altering loss themselves. Red-haired Cordy presents white.
Heartwarming and hopeful—readers will treasure this story of family and resilience. (author’s note) (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780593530252
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Rocky Pond Books/Penguin
Review Posted Online: June 13, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.
An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.
Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A deftly told story that dramatizes how Danes appointed themselves bodyguards—not only for their king, who was in the habit...
The author of the Anastasia books as well as more serious fiction (Rabble Starkey, 1987) offers her first historical fiction—a story about the escape of the Jews from Denmark in 1943.
Five years younger than Lisa in Carol Matas' Lisa's War (1989), Annemarie Johansen has, at 10, known three years of Nazi occupation. Though ever cautious and fearful of the ubiquitous soldiers, she is largely unaware of the extent of the danger around her; the Resistance kept even its participants safer by telling them as little as possible, and Annemarie has never been told that her older sister Lise died in its service. When the Germans plan to round up the Jews, the Johansens take in Annemarie's friend, Ellen Rosen, and pretend she is their daughter; later, they travel to Uncle Hendrik's house on the coast, where the Rosens and other Jews are transported by fishing boat to Sweden. Apart from Lise's offstage death, there is little violence here; like Annemarie, the reader is protected from the full implications of events—but will be caught up in the suspense and menace of several encounters with soldiers and in Annemarie's courageous run as courier on the night of the escape. The book concludes with the Jews' return, after the war, to homes well kept for them by their neighbors.
A deftly told story that dramatizes how Danes appointed themselves bodyguards—not only for their king, who was in the habit of riding alone in Copenhagen, but for their Jews. (Historical fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: April 1, 1989
ISBN: 0547577095
Page Count: 156
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1989
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