Though her adoptive father is a compassionate doctor who inspires Natalie to follow in his footsteps, and her mother a groovy and artistic lady who picks dandelions in her nightgown (a supposedly hilarious story) and does such mad things as paint her clawfoot bathtub's toenails Crimson Passion, 17-year-old Natalie Armstrong is determined to track down her natural parents. Feeling hurt at first, the Armstrongs give her time, money, documents, and a car with which to conduct her quest; and after some mechanical poking about and scarcely a setback, she manages a brief but sufficient encounter with the poised, complacently settled, famous model of 32 who had given birth at 15, after giving in just once to a demanding, immature college boy. That established, Natalie can go back to being an Armstrong and to appreciating, among the other family members, her creative sculptor grandmother who just loves "how saffron changes ordinary rice to such a marvelous shade of gold" and who amazes them all with her handmade giftwrap and her earth-toned decor. The one false note in Lowry's affecting A Summer to Die (1977) was her treatment of the "hippie" couple and the town's far-fetched intolerance. But compared to the characters and relationships here—right down to such bit-players as Natalie's very undemanding boyfriend and a modern-type librarian who helps in her search—the entire previous novel was a model of precision and subtle modulation. This one is readable, but grating.
Pub Date: March 1, 1978
ISBN: 0395264596
Page Count: 198
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1978
A coming-of-age story best appreciated by fans of genre romance.
Told she resembles one of Jane Austen’s least likable characters, an aggrieved, self-doubting teen strives to change her ways.
Marnie Barnes, 18, a wealthy senior at an upscale San Francisco boarding school, feels pressured. When her older sister Lindy was a senior, her project won the school’s prestigious Hunt Prize. Now Marnie’s desperate to win it herself—her Stanford ambitions and family’s appreciation ride on it. The third of five daughters, Marnie feels slighted by their mother, who comments unfavorably on her weight. Facing the deadline to submit her project proposal (having children read to dogs at an animal shelter), she’s neither gracious nor grateful when her roommate, Adhira Fitz, introduces her to friends with animal-shelter contacts. When exasperated Adhira compares her to Elizabeth Bennet’s awful sister, Marnie realizes she needs to change, a challenge made easier by Eugene “Whit” Whitlock, the cute boy volunteering at the animal shelter who helps get her project on track. But Marnie’s still crushing on hot venture capitalist Hayes Wellesley, Lindy’s best friend’s fiance.Unlike Austen’s Mary, Marnie is redeemable—refreshingly imperfect, her characterization mostly rings true, and it’s her struggles that will keep readers invested as the plethora of largely familiar character types move through the unruly plot. Marnie is White; Canadian Adhira, who largely functions as the supportive BFF, has relatives in India; and Whit has a White American father and Japanese mother.
A coming-of-age story best appreciated by fans of genre romance. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: March 15, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-06-306013-5
Page Count: 384
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 23, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
An exciting urban fantasy.
Among monsters—beings with human appearances and the ability to travel through time by shortening humans’ life spans—there’s a myth about a human hero who threatens their entire existence.
This hero’s arrival in London and the subsequent massacre of monsters in the city come as a shock, most of all to 16-year-old Joan Chang-Hunt, who only recently discovered that she’d inherited her deceased White English mother’s monster lineage (her human father is Chinese Malaysian). Vulnerable and uneducated about the world of monsters, Joan allies with Aaron Oliver, a White boy who is the only other living monster she can find. Putting aside centuries of enmity between the Hunt and Oliver families, the two teens flee to the 1990s together, emerging in a time before either of them or the hero were born. They quickly learn that they are no safer in the past: Someone is hunting survivors throughout time and hiding evidence of the slaughter. The initial repetition of monster as Joan deliberates various meanings of the word is monotonous, but the story soon develops into a fast-paced thriller that blurs the division between villain and hero and features a deeply conflicted protagonist caught in the middle. The rules governing time travel and details about monster society are gradually revealed, with several questions left open for exploration in the next installment.
An exciting urban fantasy. (Fantasy. 13-18)Pub Date: Feb. 22, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-06-302464-9
Page Count: 416
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Nov. 29, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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