An important, readable novel about Sanger, who changed the fate of millions of women through access to contraception.
Maggie Higgins dreams of escaping the drudgery of the endless household duties that are a poor woman’s lot in Corning, New York, in the late 1800s.
Maggie is challenged by living with many siblings, her consumptive mother, and her freethinking, but somewhat shiftless, father. Inspired by the life of birth control pioneer Margaret Sanger, Mann (Scar, 2016, etc.) has created a sympathetic character in the rebellious Maggie. Most of the book’s chapters move chronologically from the first introduction of 10-year-old Maggie in 1889 through her childhood, schooling, and departure for her new life as a nursing student in 1900. However, several chapters are set in 1899. The two timelines converge as Maggie copes with her mother’s final illness and wrestles with her father’s disapproval of her aspirations. Many of the most dramatic scenes are based in fact, as explained in the author’s note, although more minor scenes and characters are fictional. Maggie’s occasional thoughts (“I’ve almost never known my mother alone in her own body”) make clear the seeds of Sanger’s passion for family planning. The historical note provides additional information about her lifework and notably defends Sanger against the charges of racism that have been leveled against her in recent years. All characters are assumed white.
An important, readable novel about Sanger, who changed the fate of millions of women through access to contraception. (historical note, author’s note, bibliography) (Historical fiction. 11-17)Pub Date: Feb. 12, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5344-1932-2
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2018
PROFILES
Readers after an enjoyable beach romance won't go wrong with this.
What happens when your intriguing pen pal and the thorn in your side are the same person?
An aspiring songwriter, Lily is always jotting down ideas for songs—even in chemistry class. One day, she ends up writing the lyrics to one of her favorites on her desk. The next day, she sees that someone has responded to her, and as might be expected, a conversation in letters begins. Not only does the white teen start falling for her pen pal, but she finds that his revelations about his family fuel her songwriting. But then two different catastrophes strike: her guitar is damaged beyond repair, wrecking her chance of entering a songwriting contest, and Lily discovers the letter writer is preppy, white Cade Jennings, the guy she can't stand—the guy who stuck her with the nickname “Magnet,” which persists two years later. Even with what she's learned about him from his letters, Lily can't get past her own immature reactions to Cade. Will her prejudices against Cade keep Lily from happiness? The answer is predictable but still satisfying. A perfectly pleasant novel, this work seems to want to be Pride and Prejudice lite.
Readers after an enjoyable beach romance won't go wrong with this. (Romance. 12-16)Pub Date: July 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-85097-1
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Point/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: March 29, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2016
It’s the haunting details of those around Kai that readers will remember.
Kai’s life is upended when his coastal village is devastated in Japan’s 2011 earthquake and tsunami in this verse novel from an author who experienced them firsthand.
With his single mother, her parents, and his friend Ryu among the thousands missing or dead, biracial Kai, 17, is dazed and disoriented. His friend Shin’s supportive, but his intact family reminds Kai, whose American dad has been out of touch for years, of his loss. Kai’s isolation is amplified by his uncertain cultural status. Playing soccer and his growing friendship with shy Keiko barely lessen his despair. Then he’s invited to join a group of Japanese teens traveling to New York to meet others who as teenagers lost parents in the 9/11 attacks a decade earlier. Though at first reluctant, Kai agrees to go and, in the process, begins to imagine a future. Like graphic novels, today’s spare novels in verse (the subgenre concerning disasters especially) are significantly shaped by what’s left out. Lacking art’s visceral power to grab attention, verse novels may—as here—feel sparsely plotted with underdeveloped characters portrayed from a distance in elegiac monotone. Kai’s a generic figure, a coat hanger for the disaster’s main event, his victories mostly unearned; in striking contrast, his rural Japanese community and how they endure catastrophe and overwhelming losses—what they do and don’t do for one another, comforts they miss, kindnesses they value—spring to life.
It’s the haunting details of those around Kai that readers will remember. (author preface, afterword) (Verse fiction. 12-14)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-553-53474-0
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Sept. 15, 2015
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