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MAKING THE CUT

Name: MAKING THE CUT
Author: Margaret Gurevich
ISBN: 978-1-62370-112-3

From the Chloe by Design series , Vol. 1

by Margaret Gurevich ; illustrated by Brooke Hagel ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 2014

Thrills and excitement for fashion fans.

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A teen fashionista enters a reality TV designing contest.

Obsessed by fashion all her life and determined to become a designer, 16-year-old Chloe reacts with both exhilaration and fear when her favorite TV show, Design Diva, announces a series that will focus on teens, offering as prize an internship with a major designer. Encouraged by her family, her best friend and the owner of the local fabric store, Chloe works hard to create three original designs . As she succeeds in getting a spot on the show and then works through its challenges, she wavers between confidence and timidity. Complicating matters is the fact that her hometown rival, Nina, has also made it on the show, and Nina has been stealing Chloe’s designs since they were young girls. Does Chloe have a chance to win? Gurevich aims at middle schoolers, focusing on descriptions of Chloe’s designs, how she imagines them and how she fares in each stage of the competition. The arc of the show provides natural highs and lows, and the challenges that the young designers face feel typical of reality television, adding to the story’s realism. Greatly aiding the book’s appeal are the abundant fashion illustrations contributed by Hagel, allowing readers to envision nearly all the designs.

Thrills and excitement for fashion fans. (Fiction. 9-13)

Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2014

ISBN: 978-1-62370-112-3

Page Count: 384

Publisher: Capstone Young Readers

Review Posted Online: June 9, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
BALANCING ACT
by Margaret Gurevich ; illustrated by Brooke Hagel

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CLUES TO THE UNIVERSE

by Christina Li ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 12, 2021

Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.

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An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.

Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.

Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)

Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020

Categories:

CHILDREN'S FAMILY | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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NUMBER THE STARS

by Lois Lowry ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1989

A deftly told story that dramatizes how Danes appointed themselves bodyguards—not only for their king, who was in the habit...

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The author of the Anastasia books as well as more serious fiction (Rabble Starkey, 1987) offers her first historical fiction—a story about the escape of the Jews from Denmark in 1943.

Five years younger than Lisa in Carol Matas' Lisa's War (1989), Annemarie Johansen has, at 10, known three years of Nazi occupation. Though ever cautious and fearful of the ubiquitous soldiers, she is largely unaware of the extent of the danger around her; the Resistance kept even its participants safer by telling them as little as possible, and Annemarie has never been told that her older sister Lise died in its service. When the Germans plan to round up the Jews, the Johansens take in Annemarie's friend, Ellen Rosen, and pretend she is their daughter; later, they travel to Uncle Hendrik's house on the coast, where the Rosens and other Jews are transported by fishing boat to Sweden. Apart from Lise's offstage death, there is little violence here; like Annemarie, the reader is protected from the full implications of events—but will be caught up in the suspense and menace of several encounters with soldiers and in Annemarie's courageous run as courier on the night of the escape. The book concludes with the Jews' return, after the war, to homes well kept for them by their neighbors.

A deftly told story that dramatizes how Danes appointed themselves bodyguards—not only for their king, who was in the habit of riding alone in Copenhagen, but for their Jews. (Historical fiction. 9-12)