Exquisite, heartbreaking, unforgettable—and, ultimately, uplifting.
Family, art, love, duty, and longing collide in this painfully beautiful paean to the universal human need for connection.
Cupertino, California, high school senior Danny Cheng has a tight circle of friends, adoring parents, and a full scholarship to his dream school, the Rhode Island School of Design. But lurking just beneath the surface are secrets and tensions that threaten to tear apart everything he holds dear. Closeted Danny has kept hidden his longtime attraction to his best friend, Harry Wong, who is in a serious relationship with Danny’s close friend Regina Chan. Some of his parents’ oddities also turn out to be more than just eccentricity; they are hiding something dark from their past. Danny knows he had an older sister who died in China, but little beyond that. He stumbles across a mysterious file of papers, but his parents refuse to explain. Meanwhile, some in Danny’s circle of school friends are struggling with demons of their own. Gilbert paints a vivid portrait of a largely Asian-American community, diverse in terms of socio-economic status, ethnicity, and religious faith. While the topics dealt with may be heavy, the book is suffused with the warmth of the characters’ love for one another. Imperfect in their human frailty and noble in their desire to do the best they can, they are universally recognizable and sympathetic.
Exquisite, heartbreaking, unforgettable—and, ultimately, uplifting. (Fiction. 14-adult)Pub Date: April 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4847-2602-0
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: Feb. 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2018
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Though constrained, the work nevertheless stands apart in a literature that too often finds it hard to look hard truths in...
In this roller-coaster ride of a debut, the author summons the popular legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. to respond to the recent tragic violence befalling unarmed black men and boys.
Seventeen-year-old black high school senior Justyce McAllister, a full-scholarship student at the virtually all-white Braselton Prep, is the focus. After a bloody run-in with the police when they take his good deed for malice, Justyce seeks meaning in a series of letters with his “homie” Dr. King. He writes, “I thought if I made sure to be an upstanding member of society, I’d be exempt from the stuff THOSE black guys deal with, you know?” While he’s ranked fourth in his graduating class and well-positioned for the Ivy League, Justyce is coming to terms with the fact that there’s not as much that separates him from “THOSE black guys” as he’d like to believe. Despite this, Stone seems to position Justyce and his best friend as the decidedly well-mannered black children who are deserving of readers’ sympathies. They are not those gangsters that can be found in Justyce’s neighborhood. There’s nuance to be found for sure, but not enough to upset the dominant narrative. What if they weren’t the successful kids? While the novel intentionally leaves more questions than it attempts to answer, there are layers that still remain between the lines.
Though constrained, the work nevertheless stands apart in a literature that too often finds it hard to look hard truths in the face. Take interest and ask questions. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-101-93949-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 6, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2017
Dynamically reckons with the real-life ramifications of someone who refuses to grow up.
A grim, modern-day manifestation of the Peter Pan tale drawn from subtle, dark elements in the original text.
Wendy Darling is a sweet, naïve 17-year-old who just moved to Chicago. One night, Peter Pan comes through her open window, expecting an empty house and instead becoming enamored with the girl inside. Wendy herself is immediately enchanted by Peter, whose boyish charm and good looks convince her to join him for a night on the town along with his spunky and snappy ex-girlfriend Tinkerbelle. During the course of a single night, Wendy runs into more of Peter’s connections, including a collection of orphans he houses off the grid, a Detective Hook eager to bring him down, and other counterparts from the source material (including the racist caricature of a Native girl, gracefully realized here as a three-dimensional young Ojibwe woman). But as the night goes on and Peter’s facade grows more transparent, the frightful truth at his center threatens the safety of everyone involved. Eschewing literal magic, Ancrum’s remix is spellbinding and psychologically compelling despite a slower-moving middle. The haunting truth surrounding Peter is well earned and disturbing, a perfect—and bleak—transformation of the character for the 21st century. Wendy is Black, Peter and Tink are White, and the supporting cast represents myriad racial and queer identities.
Dynamically reckons with the real-life ramifications of someone who refuses to grow up. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: June 22, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-26526-5
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Imprint
Review Posted Online: April 29, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
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