For most readers, this effort sits as a curio alongside other Latin versions of modern books, truly delighting only the rare...
The Latin version of Kinney’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid (translated by Vatican Latinist Gallagher), is an exploration of new form rather than new content, much like the Shakespearean version of Star Wars or the Klingon version of Hamlet.
Cicero would ask, “Cui bono?”: for whom is this a benefit? For readers who have soldiered through the phalanxes of Latin grammar, the works of Caesar, Catullus, and Virgil have traditionally been the prizes at the end of their odysseys. Is Kinney’s work also commensurate reward for their studies? The challenge is in finding readers whose Latin skills are up to Gallagher’s Latin prose (which is sophisticated) and whose humor appreciates the travails of middle school (which are many). The decision to omit macrons (an essential vowel accent in elementary Latin texts) aims the book squarely at experienced readers rather than young Latinists. Clever Latin neologisms abound for modern words like “video games,” “heavy metal music,” and “computer,” although the Latin is a mix of calques and pseudo-Latin words (“videolusuum,” “musicae metallicae gravis,” and “computatro”).
For most readers, this effort sits as a curio alongside other Latin versions of modern books, truly delighting only the rare readers who can both navigate the syntax of Latin and giggle at the “Tactus Casei” (“Cheese Touch”). (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 10 & up)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4197-1947-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2015
Poignant, respectful, and historically accurate while pulsating with emotional turmoil, adventure, and suspense.
In the midst of political turmoil, how do you escape the only country that you’ve ever known and navigate a new life? Parallel stories of three different middle school–aged refugees—Josef from Nazi Germany in 1938, Isabel from 1994 Cuba, and Mahmoud from 2015 Aleppo—eventually intertwine for maximum impact.
Three countries, three time periods, three brave protagonists. Yet these three refugee odysseys have so much in common. Each traverses a landscape ruled by a dictator and must balance freedom, family, and responsibility. Each initially leaves by boat, struggles between visibility and invisibility, copes with repeated obstacles and heart-wrenching loss, and gains resilience in the process. Each third-person narrative offers an accessible look at migration under duress, in which the behavior of familiar adults changes unpredictably, strangers exploit the vulnerabilities of transients, and circumstances seem driven by random luck. Mahmoud eventually concludes that visibility is best: “See us….Hear us. Help us.” With this book, Gratz accomplishes a feat that is nothing short of brilliant, offering a skillfully wrought narrative laced with global and intergenerational reverberations that signal hope for the future. Excellent for older middle grade and above in classrooms, book groups, and/or communities looking to increase empathy for new and existing arrivals from afar.
Poignant, respectful, and historically accurate while pulsating with emotional turmoil, adventure, and suspense. (maps, author’s note) (Historical fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: July 25, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-545-88083-1
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2017
PROFILES
Cinematic, over-the-top decadence, a tense race against time, and lessons on what’s truly valuable.
A reward of $5,000,000 almost ruins everything for two seventh graders.
On a class trip to New York City, Felix and Benji find a wallet belonging to social media billionaire Laura Friendly. Benji, a well-off, chaotic kid with learning disabilities, swipes $20 from the wallet before they send it back to its owner. Felix, a poor, shy, rule-follower, reluctantly consents. So when Laura Friendly herself arrives to give them a reward for the returned wallet, she’s annoyed. To teach her larcenous helpers a lesson, Laura offers them a deal: a $20,000 college scholarship or slightly over $5 million cash—but with strings attached. The boys must spend all the money in 30 days, with legal stipulations preventing them from giving anything away, investing, or telling anyone about it. The glorious windfall quickly grows to become a chore and then a torment as the boys appear increasingly selfish and irresponsible to the adults in their lives. They rent luxury cars, hire a (wonderful) philosophy undergrad as a chauffeur, take their families to Disney World, and spend thousands on in-app game purchases. Yet, surrounded by hedonistically described piles of loot and filthy lucre, the boys long for simpler fundamentals. The absorbing spending spree reads like a fun family film, gleefully stuffed with the very opulence it warns against. Major characters are White.
Cinematic, over-the-top decadence, a tense race against time, and lessons on what’s truly valuable. (mathematical explanations) (Fiction. 10-12)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-17525-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
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