An imaginative, heartwarming tale of love and community.
A girl sets out to have her first kiss at Oktoberfest in this young adult novel by the Pennyeach Collective.
Twelve-year-old Milly is feeling left behind. She isn’t as physically developed as she would like to be (“I’m almost thirteen and still flat as stale soda,” she laments), and, unlike all of her friends, she’s still never kissed a boy. Her status might change, however, now that she’s discovered a new potential crush—a boy her age wearing an oversized floppy hat who she spots through binoculars while he wanders the riverfront of her Midwestern town. The town is about to begin its yearly Oktoberfest celebration; when Milly eventually learns that the floppy-hatted boy’s name is Frank, she dubs him the Frankfurter. After sighting Frankfurter three separate times on Friday, Milly makes it her mission to meet and kiss the boy on Saturday, the “fest-iest day” of the festival. It’s a tourist explosion of German American kitsch—Dachshund Races, BBQ grill-meisters, knobby-kneed dancers in lederhosen—and Milly must navigate it all if she wants to make good on her resolution. Along the way, she will have to deal with her single, overeducated mom, who uses the fact that she has no teeth to repel unwanted male attention and will soon lose her job when the town’s olive oil store closes; her long-absent dad, who has arrived back up in town as a balloon-twisting clown; and a Glee Club performance in which Milly must dress as a German boy. Will Milly make it through the day, get her kiss, and change everything? The novel brings the setting to carnivalesque life through Milly’s wonderfully bratty, ingenuous, anxious point of view. She begs one of her classmates for kissing advice: “Like how you knew when to open your mouth, and what your tongue was supposed to be doing the whole time, and if the whole deal wasn’t actually kinda gross.” The characters, location, and narrative voice are all so specific and inviting that the pages fly by, bearing the reader through the boundless chaos of late tweendom.
An imaginative, heartwarming tale of love and community.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Feb. 27, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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 compelling romance inhabited by complex and appealing characters.
When star hockey player Alec Barczewski’s estranged childhood friend, Dani Collins, moves to town, they end up in a mutually beneficial fake-dating relationship that reignites old feelings.
Following her parents’ divorce, Dani and her mom move in with Dani’s hockey legend grandfather in Southview, Minnesota, where she spent a month every summer as a child and where her friendship with Alec grew. Between visits, the two were pen pals, but they eventually fell out of touch. Despite some tensions over their loss of friendship, the high school seniors reconnect. Desperate to get off Harvard’s waitlist, Dani needs another extracurricular activity, while Alec—whose reputation took a hit when a photo of him holding a bong appeared on social media—is eager to improve his tarnished image for NHL scouts. The pair strike a deal: They’ll fake date, making Alec look like a stable guy whose academically gifted girlfriend is related to hockey royalty, and in exchange, he’ll get Dani a team manager position that will catch the eye of Harvard’s admissions officers. Eventually, complicated feelings about their past, stressful family relationships, and their brewing romance boil over. Romance fans will love the deliciously tension-filled scenes between Alec and Dani, who are believable friends with heavy demands weighing on them. They feel like real teenagers, and readers will enjoy rooting for them as the well-paced story unfolds. Main characters present white.
A compelling romance inhabited by complex and appealing characters. (Romance. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 30, 2025
ISBN: 9781665921268
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
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