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THE WAY I SAY IT

Name: THE WAY I SAY IT
Author: Nancy Tandon
ISBN: 978-1-62354-133-0

by Nancy Tandon ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 18, 2022

A touching and respectful story about friendship, feelings, and support.

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Sixth grader Rory struggles with a severe speech impediment.

It centers on his difficulty pronouncing R’s—which feels particularly unfair given his name. Middle school is no fun for a kid with a speech difficulty, but before, he could at least count on his best friend, Brent. But things have changed ever since Brent started to hang out with mean, cool kids who bully Rory; even worse, Brent is joining in their cruelty. As the bullying intensifies and their friendship recedes into the distance, it becomes increasingly hard for Rory to understand what is happening or to sort out his own complex feelings. Everything pivots into sharper relief when Brent suffers a traumatic brain injury and becomes disabled. Rory is still stung by the memory of when Brent chose to betray rather than defend him. However, when the boys are thrown together in speech therapy, their relationship changes. While this debut is a sensitive, honest, and developmentally appropriate look at two different disabilities in all their painful complexities, it is also fundamentally about relationships and emotional as well as physical healing. The text concludes with a short explanation of the complexities of creating the R sound and the many ways it appears in speech. Main characters read as White.

A touching and respectful story about friendship, feelings, and support. (Fiction. 9-12)

Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022

ISBN: 978-1-62354-133-0

Page Count: 240

Publisher: Charlesbridge

Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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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)