In the irrepressible, bittersweet style of his novels, Zindel offers an autobiographical vignette from his teen years, when he and his mother and sister shared a house in the Staten Island community of Travis with a fatherless Italian family whose warmhearted ``Nonno [grandfather] Frankie'' was the original for Zindel's The Pigman (1968). Zindel's mother was a parent to endure: histrionically suicidal, a pathological man-hater, flighty, suspicious, improvident. Somehow, Zindel survived with his humor not only intact but enriched by deflecting her bizarre behavior with his own extraordinary intelligence and wit. Despite Mom's decree that they stay away from the Vivonas, the Zindels were soon sharing the delectable meals prepared by Nonna Mamie, while Nonno Frankie shared jokes, planted a garden, and counseled Paul on battling his bullying classmates. Meanwhile, Paul found a good friend in Jennifer, who was bitterly but accurately prescient about her prospects for getting out of ``dead-end'' Travis, and Nonno encouraged them both: ``Each of you is the only one of you who will ever dance your own tarantella...listen to yourself, then you don't think of Death anymore! You think of Life!'' The real life reads so like Zindel's fiction that it's hard to believe it's all true—or that the fiction isn't. It hardly matters: the author reveals a sensitive, observant boy, struggling to reach out to kindred spirits and learning to confront pain with his inimitable brand of humor. Literal or not, there's a lot of truth in that. Photos not seen. (Autobiography. 12+)
Pub Date: Oct. 30, 1992
ISBN: 0-06-020857-0
Page Count: 160
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1992
Pitamic bites off more than she can chew with this instructional art volume, but its core projects will excite in the right context. Twelve pieces of fine art inspire two art projects apiece. Matisse’s The Snail opens the Color section; after history and analysis, there’s one project arranging multicolored tissue-paper squares and one project adding hue to white paint to create stripes of value gradation. These creative endeavors exploring value, shade, texture and various media will exhilarate young artists—but only with at best semi-successful results, as they require an adult dedicated to both advance material procurement and doing the artwork along with the child. Otherwise, complex instructions plus a frequent requirement to draw or trace realistically will cause frustration. Much of the text is above children’s heads, errors of terminology and reproduction detract and the links between the famous pieces and the projects are imprecise. However, an involved adult and an enterprising child aged seven to ten will find many of the projects fabulously challenging and rewarding. Art In Action 2 (ISBN: 978-0-7641-441-7) publishes simultaneously. (artist biographies, glossary, location of originals) (Nonfiction. Adults)
Pub Date: July 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-7641-4440-0
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Barron's
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2010
With rare honesty, a former teenage mother shares her own experiences while putting forth many other options. This is a handbook about feelings, including some—like apathy—that are rarely discussed, with emphasis on success stories whatever the choice. For Arthur herself, the experience has been both a struggle (fighting the urge to call her daughter a sister) and a joy (gaining confidence in making choices). With many lists of suggestions (stress reducers; getting realistic about the father's role; pros and cons of abortion; planning for unplanned sex; dietary precautions; going to school; etc.), the pages become an empathetic workbook in decision making. In its practicality and insistence on motivation and persistence as keys to success, this nicely complements Kuklin's What Do I Do Now? (p. 730) as must reading during a crisis—or better yet, before it occurs. Bibliography; index. (Nonfiction. 12+)
Pub Date: June 15, 1991
ISBN: 0-930934-46-6
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1991
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