Love of family is the greatest magic even when faced with the power of Death.
Thirteen-year-old twins Felix and Lee live in the same house, but they are kept separate by the Agreement between the shades Death and Memory.
In the west side of Poplar House, where Lee lives with his mother and Memory, there is laughter and fresh baked pie. In the east side, where Felix lives with his father and Death, there is nothing but sadness and cold. Lee is tasked with storing memories in jars tied with colored ribbons. Felix must brew tonics for the sick and dying and collect the life candles that have been snuffed out by Death. A failed attempt at breaking the Agreement has left the boys hopeless. However, when a mysterious death sends Gretchen, a willful neighbor girl, to their door demanding answers of Death, they decide to work with her hoping she may have the key to their release. While Lee’s days are filled with the usual middle school angst, a first crush, and a dangerous bully, Felix’s story is darker. Death is abusive and menacing. He demands perfection and is swift to dole out harsh punishment. Alternating chapters follow each of the twins and Gretchen. The suspenseful plot is unspooled slowly, but the magical elements, evocative, intelligent writing, and ever ratcheting suspense keep it interesting. Human characters seem to be default white.
Love of family is the greatest magic even when faced with the power of Death. (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4521-4986-8
Page Count: 440
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: May 27, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Some readers may feel that the resolution comes a mite too easily, but most will enjoy the journey and be pleased when...
Two sisters make an unauthorized expedition to their former hometown and in the process bring together the two parts of their divided family.
Dooley packs plenty of emotion into this eventful road trip, which takes place over the course of less than 24 hours. Twelve-year-old Ophelia, nicknamed Fella, and her 16-year-old sister, Zoey Grace, aka Zany, are the daughters of a lesbian couple, Shannon and Lacy, who could not legally marry. The two white girls squabble and share memories as they travel from West Virginia to Asheville, North Carolina, where Zany is determined to scatter Mama Lacy’s ashes in accordance with her wishes. The year is 2004, before the Supreme Court decision on gay marriage, and the girls have been separated by hostile, antediluvian custodial laws. Fella’s present-tense narration paints pictures not just of the difficulties they face on the trip (a snowstorm, car trouble, and an unlikely thief among them), but also of their lives before Mama Lacy’s illness and of the ways that things have changed since then. Breathless and engaging, Fella’s distinctive voice is convincingly childlike. The conversations she has with her sister, as well as her insights about their relationship, likewise ring true. While the girls face serious issues, amusing details and the caring adults in their lives keep the tone relatively light.
Some readers may feel that the resolution comes a mite too easily, but most will enjoy the journey and be pleased when Fella’s family figures out how to come together in a new way . (Historical fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: April 4, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-16504-7
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 31, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish.
The dreary prospect of spending a lifetime making caskets instead of wonderful inventions prompts a young orphan to snatch up his little sister and flee. Where? To the circus, of course.
Fortunately or otherwise, John and 6-year-old Page join up with Boz—sometime human cannonball for the seedy Wandering Wayfarers and a “vertically challenged” trickster with a fantastic gift for sowing chaos. Alas, the budding engineer barely has time to settle in to begin work on an experimental circus wagon powered by chicken poop and dubbed (with questionable forethought) the Autopsy. The hot pursuit of malign and indomitable Great-Aunt Beauregard, the Coggins’ only living relative, forces all three to leave the troupe for further flights and misadventures. Teele spins her adventure around a sturdy protagonist whose love for his little sister is matched only by his fierce desire for something better in life for them both and tucks in an outstanding supporting cast featuring several notably strong-minded, independent women (Page, whose glare “would kill spiders dead,” not least among them). Better yet, in Boz she has created a scene-stealing force of nature, a free spirit who’s never happier than when he’s stirring up mischief. A climactic clutch culminating in a magnificently destructive display of fireworks leaves the Coggin sibs well-positioned for bright futures. (Illustrations not seen.)
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish. (Adventure. 11-13)Pub Date: April 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234510-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Walden Pond Press/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
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