A coming-of-age adventure that’s well drawn and thoughtful.
A high school girl in the early 1970s hitchhikes across Canada to blackmail a rich boy in this YA novel.
In Eastern Canada, the town of Burgess is on the right side of the tracks while on the wrong side is Sloan Hill—or, as the more fortunate call it, Slum Hill. As the 1970 school year begins, 17-year-old Hannah Romero newly mingles with the rich kids at Burgess’ Carver High. When she realizes that Christopher Holding lives in her fantasy house, a mansion where her father is groundskeeper, she pushes her attractive best friend, Stacy, also 17, into a romance with him so she can wangle a party invitation and see inside. After taking photographs there, Hannah realizes she has evidence that Chris is dealing drugs and—oppressed by poverty and her mother’s leukemia—decides to blackmail him. But Chris has moved to Vancouver, so Hannah pressures Stacy to join her in hitchhiking west. Along the way, Hannah falls for an American draft dodger and Stacy suffers a bear attack while camping. By December 1971, Hannah’s transformative experiences have allowed her to learn from her mistakes. In her engaging second novel, Thorne at first dwells on the bitterness of poverty and the two friends’ dismal prospects. The trip west discloses many new horizons while giving Hannah a chance to contemplate other kinds of struggles, such as the young men trying to escape the horrors of Vietnam. She embarks on a vivid, mostly believable journey, from being self-centered, manipulative, and a sometime thief (she takes a pearl necklace from Chris’ house) to becoming someone able to give and receive love. But a fortuneteller’s eerily accurate predictions provide overly convenient insights, and the ending seems too unrealistic.
A coming-of-age adventure that’s well drawn and thoughtful. (YA historical fiction, 14+)Pub Date: June 2, 2021
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 219
Publisher: Soul Mate Publishing
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away.
A Mexican American boy takes on heavy responsibilities when his family is torn apart.
Mateo’s life is turned upside down the day U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents show up unsuccessfully seeking his Pa at his New York City bodega. The Garcias live in fear until the day both parents are picked up; his Pa is taken to jail and his Ma to a detention center. The adults around Mateo offer support to him and his 7-year-old sister, Sophie, however, he knows he is now responsible for caring for her and the bodega as well as trying to survive junior year—that is, if he wants to fulfill his dream to enter the drama program at the Tisch School of the Arts and become an actor. Mateo’s relationships with his friends Kimmie and Adam (a potential love interest) also suffer repercussions as he keeps his situation a secret. Kimmie is half Korean (her other half is unspecified) and Adam is Italian American; Mateo feels disconnected from them, less American, and with worries they can’t understand. He talks himself out of choosing a safer course of action, a decision that deepens the story. Mateo’s self-awareness and inner monologue at times make him seem older than 16, and, with significant turmoil in the main plot, some side elements feel underdeveloped. Aleman’s narrative joins the ranks of heart-wrenching stories of migrant families who have been separated.
An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away. (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-7595-5605-8
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A prototypical survival story: after an airplane crash, a 13-year-old city boy spends two months alone in the Canadian wilderness. In transit between his divorcing parents, Brian is the plane's only passenger. After casually showing him how to steer, the pilot has a heart attack and dies. In a breathtaking sequence, Brian maneuvers the plane for hours while he tries to think what to do, at last crashing as gently and levelly as he can manage into a lake. The plane sinks; all he has left is a hatchet, attached to his belt. His injuries prove painful but not fundamental. In time, he builds a shelter, experiments with berries, finds turtle eggs, starts a fire, makes a bow and arrow to catch fish and birds, and makes peace with the larger wildlife. He also battles despair and emerges more patient, prepared to learn from his mistakes—when a rogue moose attacks him and a fierce storm reminds him of his mortality, he's prepared to make repairs with philosophical persistence. His mixed feelings surprise him when the plane finally surfaces so that he can retrieve the survival pack; and then he's rescued. Plausible, taut, this is a spellbinding account. Paulsen's staccato, repetitive style conveys Brian's stress; his combination of third-person narrative with Brian's interior monologue pulls the reader into the story. Brian's angst over a terrible secret—he's seen his mother with another man—is undeveloped and doesn't contribute much, except as one item from his previous life that he sees in better perspective, as a result of his experience. High interest, not hard to read. A winner.
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1987
ISBN: 1416925082
Page Count: -
Publisher: Bradbury
Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1987
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