Terrifically entertaining.
Uninvited guests demand new survival skills from the McCready sisters in this follow-up to Pine Island Home (2020).
The school year is about to start when Mrs. Weatherspoon, who cared for the girls in Borneo after their parents’ death, comes to visit, upsetting the equilibrium. She arrives with another church lady, Jo Menzies, and everyone soon finds themselves towed along in Jo’s manipulative, overbearing wake. At 15, Fiona can’t relinquish the burden of being in charge of her family, shying away from their guardian Al’s willingness to pay for things. Thirteen-year-old Marlin has yet to realize her ambition to publish her cookbook. Ten-year-old Natasha’s contemplative approach to understanding the world manifests itself in a surprising way. And 8-year-old Charlie has an optimistic naïveté in the face of all this fierce independence. Jo is self-absorbed and almost comically evil in her disregard for everyone but herself. Horvath skewers those who try to wield power over others, using diet or religion or opinions as cudgels. As frustrated Fiona and Marlin find themselves feeling impotent rage, they also gain an understanding of what it means to be—and stand up for—oneself. Everyone presents as white. Horvath keeps the pace captivating in this domestic drama as she demonstrates that life’s ups and downs are inevitable. Neither certainty nor confirmation of beliefs is forthcoming—there are few comeuppances for bad behavior—but what emerges is a compelling case for self-reliance, creativity, and kindness.
Terrifically entertaining. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2023
ISBN: 9780823452958
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Margaret Ferguson/Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2023
An endearing protagonist runs the first, fast leg of Reynolds' promising relay.
Castle “Ghost” Cranshaw feels like he’s been running ever since his dad pulled that gun on him and his mom—and used it.
His dad’s been in jail three years now, but Ghost still feels the trauma, which is probably at the root of the many “altercations” he gets into at middle school. When he inserts himself into a practice for a local elite track team, the Defenders, he’s fast enough that the hard-as-nails coach decides to put him on the team. Ghost is surprised to find himself caring enough about being on the team that he curbs his behavior to avoid “altercations.” But Ma doesn’t have money to spare on things like fancy running shoes, so Ghost shoplifts a pair that make his feet feel impossibly light—and his conscience correspondingly heavy. Ghost’s narration is candid and colloquial, reminiscent of such original voices as Bud Caldwell and Joey Pigza; his level of self-understanding is both believably childlike and disarming in its perception. He is self-focused enough that secondary characters initially feel one-dimensional, Coach in particular, but as he gets to know them better, so do readers, in a way that unfolds naturally and pleasingly. His three fellow “newbies” on the Defenders await their turns to star in subsequent series outings. Characters are black by default; those few white people in Ghost’s world are described as such.
An endearing protagonist runs the first, fast leg of Reynolds' promising relay. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4814-5015-7
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Caitlyn Dlouhy/Atheneum
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016
PROFILES
SEEN & HEARD
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK TO SCREEN
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