Will inspire readers to go for their dreams, one leap at a time.
Brooklyn has one love: ballet.
She’s competing for a spot at the Texas School of the Arts, where she can focus on dance. Her first step: impress TSOTA’s scouts at the All-City Showcase with a pas de deux. Her teacher suggests a volunteer activity to round out her application and has the perfect project. Enter the fumbling (pun intended) Leighton Middle School football team; they’re taking conditioning classes at Brooklyn’s ballet studio, and Brooklyn will model the positions. Many girls in her class are excited about the boys—but not Brooklyn. The studio is her haven in her football-obsessed town, and she’s not pleased at the prospect of sharing it with boys who goof around during lessons and treat ballet like a joke. When dance partner Jayden breaks his leg, Brooklyn almost gives up on the showcase, but then her teacher suggests Logan, a football player, fill in. He agrees, on one condition: that Brooklyn give football a chance. She promises, but that will never happen. Or will it? A family dispute over Brooklyn’s superstar high school–football-player stepbrother Tanner’s future adds an extra layer of tension to the story. Brooklyn’s friend Mia is biracial, Japanese and white. Former partner Jayden is 6 feet tall and, as he calls himself “the LeBron James of ballet,” is implied black. Brooklyn, her family, and Logan are all default white (as is much of the rest of the cast).
Will inspire readers to go for their dreams, one leap at a time. (Fiction. 8-13)Pub Date: Sept. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5344-0458-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: July 29, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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 REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and...
Catrina narrates the story of her mixed-race (Latino/white) family’s move from Southern California to Bahía de la Luna on the Northern California coast.
Dad has a new job, but it’s little sister Maya’s lungs that motivate the move: she has had cystic fibrosis since birth—a degenerative breathing condition. Despite her health, Maya loves adventure, even if her lungs suffer for it and even when Cat must follow to keep her safe. When Carlos, a tall, brown, and handsome teen Ghost Tour guide introduces the sisters to the Bahía ghosts—most of whom were Spanish-speaking Mexicans when alive—they fascinate Maya and she them, but the terrified Cat wants only to get herself and Maya back to safety. When the ghost adventure leads to Maya’s hospitalization, Cat blames both herself and Carlos, which makes seeing him at school difficult. As Cat awakens to the meaning of Halloween and Day of the Dead in this strange new home, she comes to understand the importance of the ghosts both to herself and to Maya. Telgemeier neatly balances enough issues that a lesser artist would split them into separate stories and delivers as much delight textually as visually. The backmatter includes snippets from Telgemeier’s sketchbook and a photo of her in Día makeup.
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and unable to put down this compelling tale. (Graphic fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-54061-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
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