A well-written, compelling trip to a past not often portrayed in children's literature.
The Black Panthers seem to have the answers for Maxie and her friends, so when a traitor to the group is suspected, she is determined to find who is leaking information to the Chicago police.
Maxie and her brother Raheem are deeply involved with the Black Panther Party. The shooting of a close friend and ongoing conflicts with the Chicago police make the radical group seem like the only protection they can count on. Problems at home—their mother’s unemployment, drinking and various boyfriends—make the Panther office a refuge for Maxie, and she presses to become a real member: armed, trained and patrolling the streets like her brother. She is deemed too young, so when Maxie hears there may be a traitor in the Panthers, she decides to discover who it is and prove she is ready to take a real place in the organization. The discovery changes everything and forces Maxie to face almost unbearable truths. In this companion to award-winning A Rock and the River (2009), Magoon explores the role the Black Panthers played in urban communities during the tumultuous times of the late ’60s. Maxie is a believable and feisty character. Her interactions with her brother and his efforts to be the parent their mother seems incapable of being both ring true, as does her relationship with Sam, still grieving the death of his brother. Historical moments such as the riots during the 1968 Democratic National Convention strengthen the sense of time and place, but this is primarily an authentic story of a young person attempting to grasp where she will stand in the struggle.
A well-written, compelling trip to a past not often portrayed in children's literature. (Historical fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-4424-2230-8
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
It's 1937, and Anya is becoming accustomed to Shanghai. Her family had to flee Odessa in the night after Papa told that ugly policeman he wouldn't join the Communist Party. Now China is home for her whole family: Papa, Mama (a former opera singer), Mama's parents, Babushka and Dedushka, and baby brother Georgi. In Shanghai's French Quarter, they live Jewish lives as if the Japanese weren't advancing on the city. Anya's biggest worry is the prospect of telling her mother she doesn't want to become an opera singer—until the day she finds a baby in the gutter. Will Mama and Papa let her keep the baby? Anya's Shanghai is richly chaotic, polyglot and packed with refugees. Russian, Yiddish, Hebrew, Mandarin Chinese and Italian pepper the dialogue. Meanwhile, immigrant Anya happily devours her buckwheat piroshki with chopsticks after Papa has recited the Hebrew blessings over the food. The chaos of the prose is less felicitous; characters whisk between conversations without segue. A delightfully textured—but confusingly rushed—glimpse at a little-remembered period of Jewish history. (Historical fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-312-37093-0
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: Dec. 29, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2011
This sequel to A Templar's Apprentice (2010) takes Tormod in circular journeys around Scotland without particularly advancing the plot. The truth o’ yon Tormod’s powers canno’ be denied—or understood very well, given the brogue-laden prose, which lacks the accuracy for true flavor but is still thick enough to interfere with readability. Tormod is on the run with his new friend, the redheaded and equally magically gifted Aine. They skip from adventure to adventure, uncontrolled psychic abilities troubling them while they seek a Knight Templar with the gift of healing. Tormod's health suffers as his visions become worse. His travels, from discovering a village whose residents have been massacred by soldiers to a brief interaction with Robert the Bruce, are soon only interruptions; primarily his days are occupied by delirium, visions and out-of-control magical temper tantrums. At least his fever dreams are revealing the King of France's wicked plot against the Templars, but it won't do him much good as he wanders through the Highlands. A discombobulated traveling tale, best summed up in Tormod's own stream of consciousness: "Torquil. The Abbot. The Templar. Aine. Bertrand. The bairn. Cornelius. Visions. Dreams. Nightmares." (Fantasy. 9-11)
Pub Date: April 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-545-05675-5
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2011
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