Despite a few loose ends, Kim offers a charismatic heroine with plenty of grit.
A secondary character gets to tell her story in this companion title.
A lot has changed since I’m Ok (2018). Headstrong Mickey’s best friend, Ok, has moved away, and they now communicate infrequently through postcards. She and former pal Asa have also drifted apart, only sharing greetings in the hallway. And as if middle school weren’t hard enough, she still takes care of her little brother, Benny, while navigating the volatile moods of her mother, who is exhausted from working nights since her dad up and left. While Mickey scrounges up meals at home, the confidence she exudes at school means that no one there knows of her struggles. Her prospects seem to brighten when she befriends a new student, Sun Joo. Mickey takes it upon herself to help Sun Joo—or Sunny, as Mickey nicknames her—learn English and navigate American culture. Mickey also learns more about Korean culture, bumbling Korean words all along the way in a sweetly equalizing manner. When the popular Sydney threatens to steal Sunny away, Mickey struggles once again to find her footing and confidence. The tightly written narrative bursts with personality and energy, but the sheer amount of issues Mickey faces frequently takes precedence over the girls’ friendship. Sunny herself goes through a drastic transformation, but her backstory is largely left to readers’ imaginations.
Despite a few loose ends, Kim offers a charismatic heroine with plenty of grit. (Fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: June 30, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-4345-7
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: April 7, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy.
Inventively tweaking a popular premise, Jensen pits two Incredibles-style families with superpowers against each other—until a new challenge rises to unite them.
The Johnsons invariably spit at the mere mention of their hated rivals, the Baileys. Likewise, all Baileys habitually shake their fists when referring to the Johnsons. Having long looked forward to getting a superpower so that he too can battle his clan’s nemeses, Rafter Bailey is devastated when, instead of being able to fly or something else cool, he acquires the “power” to strike a match on soft polyester. But when hated classmate Juanita Johnson turns up newly endowed with a similarly bogus power and, against all family tradition, they compare notes, it becomes clear that something fishy is going on. Both families regard themselves as the heroes and their rivals as the villains. Someone has been inciting them to fight each other. Worse yet, that someone has apparently developed a device that turns real superpowers into silly ones. Teaching themselves on the fly how to get past their prejudice and work together, Rafter, his little brother, Benny, and Juanita follow a well-laid-out chain of clues and deductions to the climactic discovery of a third, genuinely nefarious family, the Joneses, and a fiendishly clever scheme to dispose of all the Baileys and Johnsons at once. Can they carry the day?
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy. (Adventure. 10-12)Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-06-220961-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
Problem-solving through perseverance and friendship is the real win in this deeply smart and inspiring story.
Leaving Brooklyn behind, Black math-whiz and puzzle lover Bree starts a new life in Florida, where she’ll be tossed into the deep end in more ways than one. Keeping her head above water may be the trickiest puzzle yet.
While her dad is busy working and training in IT, Bree struggles at first to settle into Enith Brigitha Middle School, largely due to the school’s preoccupation with swimming—from the accomplishments of its namesake, a Black Olympian from Curaçao, to its near victory at the state swimming championships. But Bree can’t swim. To illustrate her anxiety around this fact, the graphic novel’s bright colors give way to gray thought bubbles with thick, darkened outlines expressing Bree’s deepest fears and doubts. This poignant visual crowds some panels just as anxious feelings can crowd the thoughts of otherwise star students like Bree. Ultimately, learning to swim turns out to be easy enough with the help of a kind older neighbor—a Black woman with a competitive swimming past of her own as well as a rich and bittersweet understanding of Black Americans’ relationship with swimming—who explains to Bree how racist obstacles of the past can become collective anxiety in the present. To her surprise, Bree, with her newfound water skills, eventually finds herself on the school’s swim team, navigating competition, her anxiety, and new, meaningful relationships.
Problem-solving through perseverance and friendship is the real win in this deeply smart and inspiring story. (Graphic fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: May 17, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-06-305677-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: HarperAlley
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
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