A witty YA voyage with plenty of narrative power.
In Collison’s (Star-Crossed, 2006, etc.) YA adventure, a teen on a character-building excursion at sea faces challenges larger than getting along with his crewmates when the spirit of a destructive ancient Chinese ghost appears.
James McCafferty has the bad luck to be shanghaied by his mother and her boyfriend and sent aboard the Chinese junk Good Fortune. He is not a happy sailor. While the other teens possess what might pass as conventional behavior problems—the bookish boy obsessed with weapons, the tattooed punk girl, the adopted Asian kleptomaniac, the bully and his minions—James is different. He isn’t a bad kid; he just sees and hears dead people, who now pursue the Good Fortune as it wanders to the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Yu Chin, the spirit of a 700-year-old Chinese eunuch in the imperial court, talks to James, berates him as a weakling, then tells him his plan to take over his body and send him to hell. Until then, readers’ are treated to plenty of irreverent Holden Caulfield–like wit along with James’ spot-on observations, which seem to keep him afloat as the situation takes on water. When the chipper youth counselor Marty—“a continuous public service announcement”—and first mate Miles disappear and Capt. Dan, who “looks more like somebody’s fat, stoned uncle,” dies, the ship is inexorably drawn toward a fate that involves a parallel spirit world and an ancient Chinese power struggle. The abandoned teens don’t become as feral as those in The Lord of the Flies; instead, their camaraderie comes in handy just as a ghost armada raises itself from the deep. Much interesting information on Chinese sailing ships and mythology is introduced, and while not all of it is essential to the plot, Collison deftly prevents the info from talking down to young readers or encumbering the story.
A witty YA voyage with plenty of narrative power.Pub Date: May 27, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-943404-00-1
Page Count: 182
Publisher: Old Salt Press
Review Posted Online: May 12, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Slight poems with flashes of splendor but lacking real power.
This slim volume of poems explores the writer’s experience, using images and themes from nature.
Like the hawk on a wire in the titular poem, novice author Butler closely observes the natural world around her, often relating it to her own life. Having lived on farms in California and Oregon, as well as aboard a sailboat, Butler can draw upon an array of experiences. Several poems relate to cultivating gardens. “On My Farm” describes a tractor going through rows of lettuce, “the earth incumbent with nutrient.” In “Drops of Red,” one of the book’s more successful poems, the poet’s father is “driving the dusty green combine….The dust smells of toasted flour.” Such images are specific yet surprising: “incumbent” feels just right for moist, rich earth; “toasted” conveys the smell and feel of a hot day spent harvesting wheat. In “Traffic Dancing,” one of the few urban poems, Butler succinctly conjures the choreography of traffic: “a cotillion reel at an intersection.” In other poems, however, Butler’s metaphors are weak. The force of a metaphor comes from the surprising magnetism between two dissimilar things, but in “Honey Bees,” she compares clover honey to golden molasses—similar commodities—and then to tupelo honey, another comparable product. In “Bootjack,” she describes her favorite riding boots: “those boots are like / a second skin / protecting tender toes.” But there’s no “like” about it. Several poems have an intriguing sense of mystery, especially “Forgotten Moon,” in which an old couple sits in silence in a mountaintop house: “There is a footprint in that bog of red flowered thorns. / He’s forgotten her name but it will come / when the golden boat sinks into the sea.” The ghostly footprint leaves a haunting impression. Other poems are more puzzling than mysterious. “Traversing the Peninsula,” for instance, describes walking across the sand, where “The cold wrapped my ankles…anchoring me there.” How can she be traveling yet anchored? At times, Butler doesn’t seem to mind her words closely enough. The unsuccessful poems here simply present an image or situation, without closing the loop—there’s no tock for the opening tick. “Windswept,” for example, presents a rising autumn moon and the twilight air, then ends; “A Walk at Sunrise” describes just that, no more. Poems like these seem content at being pretty postcards.
Slight poems with flashes of splendor but lacking real power.Pub Date: April 3, 2012
ISBN: 978-1434914484
Page Count: 46
Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Co.
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Realistic, multifaceted characters make for an especially engaging novel.
This gripping historical romance set at the dawn of the civil rights movement examines the personal and political repercussions of an illicit love affair between a black servant and a politically ambitious white man.
The chemistry between Ash Kroth, a talented, charismatic law student, and Catherine Wilkes, his family’s new servant for the summer and a student at the local Negro university, is obvious from the moment they meet. The Kroths have employed Catherine’s family for years and have treated them with respect and dignity despite the politically volatile climate and the racist speeches Ash’s father writes as the chief speechwriter for the governor of an unnamed Southern state. Ash and Catherine can only resist each other for so long until they begin their torrid love affair, which lasts until Catherine winds up pregnant and tragedy ensues. As years go by, Ash achieves his political goals. While trying to contain the chaos brought to his state by the civil rights movement, he attempts to reconcile both his past with Catherine and the family life they could have had. He also must keep a firm grip on his own children. McKenzie’s characters are complex, and their relationships with each other are fascinating. Ash, in particular, is intriguingly ambivalent: He has a weak constitution for conflict within his own family, yet he’s a powerful politician; he’s a segregationist determined to keep the state separate but equal, yet he felt Catherine was his soul mate. The only drawback to this fast-paced, suspenseful novel is the slightly rushed conclusion; the loose ends are wrapped up a bit too neatly for such dynamic characters. Nonetheless, McKenzie proves herself to be an effortless storyteller who sympathetically portrays the ironies and hypocrisies of those precarious times.
Realistic, multifaceted characters make for an especially engaging novel.Pub Date: Oct. 25, 2011
ISBN: 978-1466473003
Page Count: 370
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: July 23, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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