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BERNICE BUTTMAN, MODEL CITIZEN

Name: BERNICE BUTTMAN, MODEL CITIZEN
Author: Niki Lenz
ISBN: 978-1-5247-7041-9

by Niki Lenz ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 26, 2019

Yay for Bernice.

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Fifth-grader Bernice has no friends due to her reputation as a fearsome bully.

She lashes out at everyone, especially those who taunt her and reinforce her vision of herself as fat, ugly, and stupid. But early on readers learn other truths about her. Her four older brothers are out of control, and her mother is completely self-centered and a bully herself. Bernice doesn’t even have a real bed in their cramped trailer. The public library is her only sanctuary, and the librarian encourages her to research information on the computer. She dreams of attending a stunt camp and devises a fraudulent story for a funding website, managing to raise a substantial sum—which her mother promptly steals from her to use for her own California dream. Bernice is sent to live with her aunt at St. Drogo’s, a tiny church and abbey in the town of Halfway, Texas. Sister Mary Margaret, aka Aunt Josephine, is welcoming and kind, as are the other nuns. Here she is determined to become the New Bernice. There are a few hilarious glitches along the way and one very serious setback, but she makes a friend, learns to ride a horse, and saves the church from closing. Lenz employs several stereotypes in setting and characters—Bernice’s family are collectively the cartoon embodiment of “poor white trash”—but Bernice is pragmatic, complex, and compelling, and she has a heart of gold.

Yay for Bernice. (Fiction. 9-12)

Pub Date: March 26, 2019

ISBN: 978-1-5247-7041-9

Page Count: 240

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: Nov. 11, 2018

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2018

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY

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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)