An original narrative voice filled with humor and poignant truth telling.
Fourteen-year-old Quentin “Quagmire” Tiarello takes care of his mother, who has undiagnosed bipolar disorder.
Sometimes his mom disappears for a couple of days. While he waits for her to return after “a spin,” Quag, who presents white, tries to survive on his own, even if that means scavenging from a pizza parlor’s dumpster. He already knows that her illness must remain secret, so he avoids the nosy neighbor and keeps to himself. But after his crush, Cassie, invites him to join her and her friends at the YMCA’s ArtCamp, Quag signs on to operate the soundboard for their radio play. Eventually, though, his mom shows up outside the Y, and Quag is taken for a wild ride: She whisks him far away from their home in central New York, leaving his friends in the dark. Quag realizes, though, that he can’t keep his mother safe anymore. After seeking help from his uncle, Quag must decide whether or not to open up to his friends. The novel realistically and empathetically addresses struggles around mental illness: Quag takes on heavy adult responsibilities with intelligence and compassion, and, despite his mother’s abandonment of him, readers understand Quag’s love for her as he recounts her more resilient and caring moments. Short passages about birds interspersed throughout the narrative reflect Quag’s personal growth. Readers will find themselves emotionally invested in this journey.
An original narrative voice filled with humor and poignant truth telling. (author’s note with resources) (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2024
ISBN: 9780063324664
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Clarion/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK TO SCREEN
An endearing protagonist runs the first, fast leg of Reynolds' promising relay.
Castle “Ghost” Cranshaw feels like he’s been running ever since his dad pulled that gun on him and his mom—and used it.
His dad’s been in jail three years now, but Ghost still feels the trauma, which is probably at the root of the many “altercations” he gets into at middle school. When he inserts himself into a practice for a local elite track team, the Defenders, he’s fast enough that the hard-as-nails coach decides to put him on the team. Ghost is surprised to find himself caring enough about being on the team that he curbs his behavior to avoid “altercations.” But Ma doesn’t have money to spare on things like fancy running shoes, so Ghost shoplifts a pair that make his feet feel impossibly light—and his conscience correspondingly heavy. Ghost’s narration is candid and colloquial, reminiscent of such original voices as Bud Caldwell and Joey Pigza; his level of self-understanding is both believably childlike and disarming in its perception. He is self-focused enough that secondary characters initially feel one-dimensional, Coach in particular, but as he gets to know them better, so do readers, in a way that unfolds naturally and pleasingly. His three fellow “newbies” on the Defenders await their turns to star in subsequent series outings. Characters are black by default; those few white people in Ghost’s world are described as such.
An endearing protagonist runs the first, fast leg of Reynolds' promising relay. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4814-5015-7
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Caitlyn Dlouhy/Atheneum
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016
PROFILES
SEEN & HEARD
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