Life lessons, baseball, and good friends; it’s all here.
Twelve-year-olds Jimmie and Lola will always be best friends forever. That’s Rule No. 12.
Shibe Park’s very short right-field fence is across the street from the flat-roofed houses where they live, allowing them to see all the home games of their beloved Philadelphia Athletics from a unique perspective. Homeowners set up bleachers on the roofs (Rule No. 11), charging a small fee for fans who can’t afford stadium tickets, which provides essential income for the families struggling in the Great Depression. Now Mr. Shibe wants to build a high spite fence to block their view, which will endanger their economic survival. Influenced by his other rules involving responsibility and commitment, Jimmie comes up with several harebrained schemes to stop Mr. Shibe while staying constantly watchful of the Polinski brothers, frightening neighborhood bullies (Rule No. 19). Lola abets him in his schemes, but when the dangers seem to outweigh any benefits, their friendship is nearly destroyed. Barr carefully constructs a well-paced adventure, involving some real events in a very specific time and place, while making Jimmie’s worries about negotiating that world completely accessible to modern readers. All the characters, assumed white, are well-developed, even the real Connie Mack and Jimmie Foxx. Quotes from the 1934 Sporting News that head many chapters further illuminate the actual events. The wall gets built, but friendship endures.
Life lessons, baseball, and good friends; it’s all here. (author’s note, photographs, resources) (Historical fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: March 26, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-68437-178-5
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Calkins Creek/Boyds Mills
Review Posted Online: Dec. 4, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2019
Glitzy glimpses of life on the make, lightened by a focus on alternatives rather than consequences.
A con man’s son yearns for a different way of life.
Having helped his single dad fleece wealthy marks since kindergarten, Trey is adept at spotting their rich offspring in each new school he attends and cultivating them until the time comes for a quick getaway. Now that he’s 12, though, the urge to make real friends and put down some roots has become insistent—particularly since he’s drawn to Kaylee, a new classmate in his latest middle school. How can he convince his dad, who’s in the midst of luring local investors into a fantastically lucrative scheme involving a fictive electric car, that it’s time to bag the family profession and settle down? Korman goes more for ironic humor than the physical or stand-up sort in this book, as shown by Trey’s enrollment in an ethics class that forces him into some decidedly hypocritical stances. Much like Trey himself, instant new bestie Logan and his parents turn out to be not at all who they seem. And though there are no bullies or real baddies in the cast on the way to the story’s rosy but implausible resolution, Trey’s malign, high-strung, and wildly reckless huckster of a little sister from hell definitely adds both conflict and suspense to this provocative outing. Main characters read white.
Glitzy glimpses of life on the make, lightened by a focus on alternatives rather than consequences. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: July 2, 2024
ISBN: 9781338826753
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2024
Deeply moving and tender.
Mo Gallagher’s life is upended when her beloved grandmother dies and she is thrust into foster care.
Nan had been her loving guardian, raising her in a New York City apartment that she must now leave. Her uncle is unwilling to assume her care, but he gives her a notebook with a letter to her from Nan on the first page. Hoping to remain connected in some mystical way, 11-year-old White girl Mo fills the notebook with frank letters to her grandmother, hoping for signs that she is being heard. But in the rest of her life, she withholds critical feelings and information, even avoiding telling Crystal Wang, her Chinese American best friend, the truth. The chance discovery of a homemade cookbook leads to a brilliant recipe project with her own website (recipes are also shared throughout the book). Her caring caseworker and her therapist help Mo deal with changes, especially as her uneasy relationship with her foster parents leads to a devastating surprise. Fortunately, Crystal remains a stalwart, loving ally, and Mo develops special relationships with a variety of supportive new friends. Mo is confused, feisty, frightened, sometimes self-destructive, intensely needy, and loving—and she has a bigger heart and is stronger than she thinks. Readers will laugh, cry, and embrace Mo completely as they rejoice at the wonderful twist that leads to a happy new beginning for her. The New York City setting is well integrated into the story.
Deeply moving and tender. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Feb. 21, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-984893-87-1
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Nov. 28, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2022
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