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KEPLER'S DREAM

Name: KEPLER'S DREAM
Author: Juliet Bell
ISBN: 978-0-399-25645-5

by Juliet Bell ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 10, 2012

Utterly satisfying.

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With her mother off on a lunar mission—a last-ditch treatment for leukemia—Ella is left circling like astronaut Michael Collins awaiting the hoped-for reunion. She and her mom have always admired Collins’ bravery, and it turns out the analogy has personal resonance.

When no one else is able to take Ella, she is sent to stay with GM (Grandmother/General Major), a woman Ella has never met. Or has she? The family history is as difficult to navigate as GM’s peacock-ridden, jam-packed hacienda. At "Broken Family Camp," Ella discovers that her grandfather was an astronomer who had been inspired by Kepler’s work and met Collins. Grandfather’s accidental death many years earlier is still keenly felt by GM, so when their valuable copy of Kepler’s Dream is stolen, Ella resolves to find the thief. Every detail is relevant in this tightly plotted debut peopled with an unforgettable cast of characters. More family drama than mystery, the story is told in Ella’s voice—compassionate, clever, preadolescent-snarky—allowing Bell to treat weighty issues with a light touch. Ella learns how blame can tear a family apart and how forgiveness and the things of which dreams are made can heal. The credibly realistic resolution leaves Ella firmly grounded with deepened family ties, a new friend and some hard-won horseback-riding skills.

Utterly satisfying. (Fiction. 10-14)

Pub Date: May 10, 2012

ISBN: 978-0-399-25645-5

Page Count: 256

Publisher: Putnam

Review Posted Online: March 13, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2012

Categories:

CHILDREN'S FAMILY | CHILDREN'S HEALTH & DAILY LIVING

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SEE YOU IN THE COSMOS

by Jack Cheng ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 28, 2017

Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious.

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If you made a recording to be heard by the aliens who found the iPod, what would you record?

For 11-year-old Alex Petroski, it's easy. He records everything. He records the story of how he travels to New Mexico to a rocket festival with his dog, Carl Sagan, and his rocket. He records finding out that a man with the same name and birthday as his dead father has an address in Las Vegas. He records eating at Johnny Rockets for the first time with his new friends, who are giving him a ride to find his dead father (who might not be dead!), and losing Carl Sagan in the wilds of Las Vegas, and discovering he has a half sister. He even records his own awful accident. Cheng delivers a sweet, soulful debut novel with a brilliant, refreshing structure. His characters manage to come alive through the “transcript” of Alex’s iPod recording, an odd medium that sounds like it would be confusing but really works. Taking inspiration from the Voyager Golden Record released to space in 1977, Alex, who explains he has “light brown skin,” records all the important moments of a journey that takes him from a family of two to a family of plenty.

Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious. (Fiction. 10-14)

Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017

ISBN: 978-0-399-18637-0

Page Count: 320

Publisher: Dial Books

Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

- BOOK REVIEW
THE MANY MASKS OF ANDY ZHOU
by Jack Cheng ; illustrated by Jack Cheng

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NOWHERE BOY

by Katherine Marsh ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 7, 2018

A captivating book situated in present-day discourse around the refugee crisis, featuring two boys who stand by their high...

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Two parallel stories, one of a Syrian boy from Aleppo fleeing war, and another of a white American boy, son of a NATO contractor, dealing with the challenges of growing up, intersect at a house in Brussels.

Ahmed lost his father while crossing the Mediterranean. Alone and broke in Europe, he takes things into his own hands to get to safety but ends up having to hide in the basement of a residential house. After months of hiding, he is discovered by Max, a boy of similar age and parallel high integrity and courage, who is experiencing his own set of troubles learning a new language, moving to a new country, and being teased at school. In an unexpected turn of events, the two boys and their new friends Farah, a Muslim Belgian girl, and Oscar, a white Belgian boy, successfully scheme for Ahmed to go to school while he remains in hiding the rest of the time. What is at stake for Ahmed is immense, and so is the risk to everyone involved. Marsh invites art and history to motivate her protagonists, drawing parallels to gentiles who protected Jews fleeing Nazi terror and citing present-day political news. This well-crafted and suspenseful novel touches on the topics of refugees and immigrant integration, terrorism, Islam, Islamophobia, and the Syrian war with sensitivity and grace.

A captivating book situated in present-day discourse around the refugee crisis, featuring two boys who stand by their high values in the face of grave risk and succeed in drawing goodwill from others. (Historical fiction. 10-14)