A great concept obliterated by a lack of focus.
A teenage runaway makes the best of a bad situation.
Xander’s had his share of hardships, and he can’t wait to finish high school and go off to college and start his life far away from the small town and painful memories. But when Xander’s rage-filled father kills Xander’s mom, things take a sudden turn for the worse. With his father on the lam, the skinny white teen makes a hasty decision to skip town, armed with a fake ID, a knife, and a handful of cash, eventually settling in Burlington, Vermont. Running away is just the first of several increasingly poor decisions Xander makes. Readers will fume as Xander makes boneheaded moves over and over again. More frustrating is the author’s curious decision to ignore the pulpy possibilities inherent in the novel’s premise and turn the latter half of the book into a character study. Unfortunately, the author’s characters don’t hold up to much analysis. Xander befriends a black Manic Pixie Dream Girl named Kat, who is full of groaners like “One of the worst things we can do to people is not see them.” The conversations between Xander and Kat stop the novel’s momentum. Who cares about existential angst when there’s a violent killer on the loose tracking down the protagonist?
A great concept obliterated by a lack of focus. (Thriller. 12-16)Pub Date: June 7, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-63450-639-7
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Sky Pony Press
Review Posted Online: March 29, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
An uneven spin-off that will likely appeal to fans of the original franchise.
Readers return to the world of Agrabah from the Disney film Aladdin, this time from the perspective of Princess Jasmine as she faces her biggest challenge yet.
Tragedy strikes Agrabah and the royal family when the sultan is found dead. Even as she grieves her father, Jasmine must worry about her succession to the throne and the growing concerns of a supernatural evil creeping into the kingdom. Though Jasmine feels unprepared to take her father’s place, she accepts her fate. When a challenger emerges and lays claim to the throne, Jasmine must fight to erase everyone’s doubts about a young woman’s ability to reign and take her rightful place as the first sultana. It is interesting to see Agrabah through the perspective of Jasmine and to encounter characters both familiar and new. Monir builds on the Persian-inspired world by giving the new characters Persian names and including nuanced cultural elements. Fighting against long-held traditions and forging a place for women to be equals alongside men are timely themes, and Monir shows Jasmine’s resolve to be a just and suitable leader despite the frightening situations she often encounters. There is a lot of compelling buildup surrounding the mysterious and supernatural elements haunting Jasmine and her world, but the eventual reveal feels confusing and haphazardly patched together.
An uneven spin-off that will likely appeal to fans of the original franchise. (Fantasy. 12-16)Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2023
ISBN: 9781368048217
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
It’s the haunting details of those around Kai that readers will remember.
Kai’s life is upended when his coastal village is devastated in Japan’s 2011 earthquake and tsunami in this verse novel from an author who experienced them firsthand.
With his single mother, her parents, and his friend Ryu among the thousands missing or dead, biracial Kai, 17, is dazed and disoriented. His friend Shin’s supportive, but his intact family reminds Kai, whose American dad has been out of touch for years, of his loss. Kai’s isolation is amplified by his uncertain cultural status. Playing soccer and his growing friendship with shy Keiko barely lessen his despair. Then he’s invited to join a group of Japanese teens traveling to New York to meet others who as teenagers lost parents in the 9/11 attacks a decade earlier. Though at first reluctant, Kai agrees to go and, in the process, begins to imagine a future. Like graphic novels, today’s spare novels in verse (the subgenre concerning disasters especially) are significantly shaped by what’s left out. Lacking art’s visceral power to grab attention, verse novels may—as here—feel sparsely plotted with underdeveloped characters portrayed from a distance in elegiac monotone. Kai’s a generic figure, a coat hanger for the disaster’s main event, his victories mostly unearned; in striking contrast, his rural Japanese community and how they endure catastrophe and overwhelming losses—what they do and don’t do for one another, comforts they miss, kindnesses they value—spring to life.
It’s the haunting details of those around Kai that readers will remember. (author preface, afterword) (Verse fiction. 12-14)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-553-53474-0
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Sept. 15, 2015
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