An uplifting gem.
To rescue his father from prison, 11-year-old Oliver “Spaghetti-O” Jones tries to get a little help from his favorite luchador.
After months of legal woes, Oliver’s father ends up in a Florida correctional center despite his assurances to Oliver and his irritable big sister, Louisa, that “[e]verything was going to be fine.” Now Louisa won’t even talk to their father, but Oliver’s not giving up that easily. Inspired by his favorite luchador-turned–action hero, Tito the Bonecrusher (motto: “Never quit trying!”), Oliver needs to concoct a plan to bust his father out of prison. To do so, he must infiltrate a charity gala to meet the bombastic action star, who holds the know-how required for such a daring caper. Thomson’s excellent middle-grade debut plumbs the absurdity and desperation inherent in a painful situation. Throughout the ordeal, Oliver battles and suppresses his grief and pain in a way that younger readers can recognize and perhaps understand amid the humor; more than anything, it’s this implicit focus that makes this novel a great one. Going along for the tumultuous ride is Oliver’s best friend, Brain (a girl genius), and some unexpected allies. Each scheme (celebrity photos with forged signatures, skipping detention via a decoy) seems more outrageous than the last, but when the day of the gala arrives, will Oliver have what it takes to save the day? A white default is assumed.
An uplifting gem. (Fiction. 8-11)Pub Date: March 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-374-30353-2
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
SEEN & HEARD
Certain to elicit both gales of giggles and winces of sympathy (not to mention recognition) from young readers.
First volume of a planned three, this edited version of an ongoing online serial records a middle-school everykid’s triumphs and (more often) tribulations through the course of a school year.
Largely through his own fault, mishaps seem to plague Greg at every turn, from the minor freak-outs of finding himself permanently seated in class between two pierced stoners and then being saddled with his mom for a substitute teacher, to being forced to wrestle in gym with a weird classmate who has invited him to view his “secret freckle.” Presented in a mix of legible “hand-lettered” text and lots of simple cartoon illustrations with the punch lines often in dialogue balloons, Greg’s escapades, unwavering self-interest and sardonic commentary are a hoot and a half.
Certain to elicit both gales of giggles and winces of sympathy (not to mention recognition) from young readers. (Fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: April 1, 2007
ISBN: 0-8109-9313-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2007
SEEN & HEARD
PERSPECTIVES
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