A tender and timely tale; likely to inspire future animal rights activists.
In this novel, a large, juvenile polar bear forages for food in the Canadian town of Churchill, an experience that ends his life in the wild.
In Inuit poetry, the polar bear is called Pihoqahiak, “the ever-wandering one.” But in Ryan’s poignant tale about the plight of wild animals whose territory begins to intersect with human civilization, the free-roaming days of a polar bear who becomes known as Patch are over as quickly as they began. It is Halloween eve in 1986, and the 2-year-old bear has discovered there is tasty garbage to be consumed in Churchill, on the southwestern shore of Hudson Bay. He enters a house, causes a commotion, and rushes out the front door, spotting 11-year-old Jordan Johnson on the street. He charges after the frightened boy and is quickly shot with a tranquilizer dart by a bear-patrol officer. The animal is then taken to a holding cell in an airport hangar. The next day, Jordan and his 14-year-old sister, Raven, visit the caged bear. The magnificent youngster is huge, weighing close to 400 pounds “and standing…over seven feet tall. His fur was dense, his paws huge and the muscles on his hindquarters bulged and strained as the bear stood upright.” Looking directly at Jordan, he lets out a massive growl, opening his mouth wide and revealing a gray patch on his tongue. The mark will earn him his name and enable Jordan and Raven to follow his journeys, first to a German zoo, then to a traveling circus. Ryan’s novel, aimed at middle-grade and YA readers, is both engaging and informative. The author includes tidbits about polar bear life in the wild, such as how the animals fish and spread their paws out wide to minimize the risk of falling through thin ice. And she vividly portrays the variety of Patch’s experiences in captivity—some of them gentle, others terribly cruel. Heart-tugging scenes capture the bear pacing in boredom or feeling listless, with a damaged coat from malnutrition and the heat. Jordan and Raven are pleasant human protagonists, determined to free the bear, but it is the majestic Patch who will linger in readers’ minds long after the final page.
A tender and timely tale; likely to inspire future animal rights activists.Pub Date: March 24, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5305-4127-0
Page Count: 124
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Dolphin lovers will appreciate this look at our complicated relationship with these marine mammals.
Is dolphin-assisted therapy so beneficial to patients that it’s worth keeping a wild dolphin captive?
Twelve-year-old Lily has lived with her emotionally distant oncologist stepfather and a succession of nannies since her mother died in a car accident two years ago. Nannies leave because of the difficulty of caring for Adam, Lily’s severely autistic 4-year-old half brother. The newest, Suzanne, seems promising, but Lily is tired of feeling like a planet orbiting the sun Adam. When she meets blind Zoe, who will attend the same private middle school as Lily in the fall, Lily’s happy to have a friend. However, Zoe’s take on the plight of the captive dolphin, Nori, used in Adam’s therapy opens Lily’s eyes. She knows she must use her influence over her stepfather, who is consulting on Nori’s treatment for cancer (caused by an oil spill), to free the animal. Lily’s got several fine lines to walk, as she works to hold onto her new friend, convince her stepfather of the rightness of releasing Nori, and do what’s best for Adam. In her newest exploration of animal-human relationships, Rorby’s lonely, mature heroine faces tough but realistic situations. Siblings of children on the spectrum will identify with Lily. If the tale flirts with sentimentality and some of the characters are strident in their views, the whole never feels maudlin or didactic.
Dolphin lovers will appreciate this look at our complicated relationship with these marine mammals. (Fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: May 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-545-67605-2
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2015
Bishop’s spectacular photographs of the tiny red-eyed tree frog defeat an incidental text from Cowley (Singing Down the Rain, 1997, etc.). The frog, only two inches long, is enormous in this title; it appears along with other nocturnal residents of the rain forests of Central America, including the iguana, ant, katydid, caterpillar, and moth. In a final section, Cowley explains how small the frog is and aspects of its life cycle. The main text, however, is an afterthought to dramatic events in the photos, e.g., “But the red-eyed tree frog has been asleep all day. It wakes up hungry. What will it eat? Here is an iguana. Frogs do not eat iguanas.” Accompanying an astonishing photograph of the tree frog leaping away from a boa snake are three lines (“The snake flicks its tongue. It tastes frog in the air. Look out, frog!”) that neither advance nor complement the action. The layout employs pale and deep green pages and typeface, and large jewel-like photographs in which green and red dominate. The combination of such visually sophisticated pages and simplistic captions make this a top-heavy, unsatisfying title. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-590-87175-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1999
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