The disaffection Nell develops after his parents and siblings are killed in a car crash probably helps him through the next disaster, as his grandparents and then, it seems, everyone in the world is killed off by a plague that first hits the aged and then works down. Nell experiences the one-day fever but somehow escapes the hideous second stage, a swift premature aging process; from then on he goes methodically about the business of survival, finally tracking down two girls—gentle, passive Lucy with whom he comes to a romantic understanding, and hostile Billie, her companion, who bitterly resents his homing in. Christopher is well known for his post-Disaster science fantasies, but this totally credible adventure, set in a very immediate future, requires no imaginative reorientation. Most impressively, Christopher repeatedly confounds one's expectations of an easy out. The plagueorphaned children whom Nell takes in early on, and who seem destined to break through his protective numbness, age and die before his eyes; the other survivor, probably around his own age, who sends out his address by balloon, turns out to have hanged himself shortly before Nell's arrival—a real jolt, this, but one that shocks Nell into seeking others; and when Billie at last lures him away and tries to kill him, Nell and Lucy pass up the chance to get off on their own, instead taking her back into their lives despite the likely risk and certain aggravation. Of Nell's experiences and encounters only the acquiescent Lucy seems the figment of an adolescent male (and pretty weak) imagination; the rest is compellingly chilly, and real as tomorrow's breakfast.
Pub Date: March 20, 1978
ISBN: 0140373888
Page Count: 134
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: April 18, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1978
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A validating and breathtaking next chapter of a Mother Goose favorite.
Humpty Dumpty, classically portrayed as an egg, recounts what happened after he fell off the wall in Santat’s latest.
An avid ornithophile, Humpty had loved being atop a high wall to be close to the birds, but after his fall and reassembly by the king’s men, high places—even his lofted bed—become intolerable. As he puts it, “There were some parts that couldn’t be healed with bandages and glue.” Although fear bars Humpty from many of his passions, it is the birds he misses the most, and he painstakingly builds (after several papercut-punctuated attempts) a beautiful paper plane to fly among them. But when the plane lands on the very wall Humpty has so doggedly been avoiding, he faces the choice of continuing to follow his fear or to break free of it, which he does, going from cracked egg to powerful flight in a sequence of stunning spreads. Santat applies his considerable talent for intertwining visual and textual, whimsy and gravity to his consideration of trauma and the oft-overlooked importance of self-determined recovery. While this newest addition to Santat’s successes will inevitably (and deservedly) be lauded, younger readers may not notice the de-emphasis of an equally important part of recovery: that it is not compulsory—it is OK not to be OK.
A validating and breathtaking next chapter of a Mother Goose favorite. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-62672-682-6
Page Count: 45
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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