A longish but high-spirited read with a powerful young hero.
In this debut fantasy, a boy who is bullied at school gains confidence and acceptance in magic camp.
Fifth-grader Ezekiel Raroso has magic in his blood. Unfortunately, he doesn’t know this, and when strange things happen around him—the disastrous eruption of his science project, for example—he starts thinking of himself as a weirdo. Ezekiel has a few friends at school, but for the most part, he is shunned and bullied. His loving family has never told him the truth about his past—not even when Ezekiel’s powers become too strong to cover up and he’s sent to magic camp. Camp Strange, as Ezekiel dubs it, is for Faerman children—what the outside world would call fairies. Ezekiel’s ignorance makes him an outsider here, too, at first; but his good nature allows him to make friends with other Fledglings (first-year campers), and he soon begins to enjoy himself. He even sprouts wings. Camp Strange, in fact, is the best thing ever. But there are sinister happenings behind the scenes: rumors that the Hematites (dark, wing-stealing Faerman) have returned. Will Ezekiel and his friends survive their first camp? Perez follows squarely in the footsteps of J.K. Rowling—from Ezekiel’s unmitigated bullying, dark legacy, and natural aptitude for both magic and flying to such facets as magical houses and cuisines and the camp’s bearded Magnus Magister. But Ezekiel is a less hotheaded 11-year-old than Harry Potter was. Ezekiel’s most prominent quality is his empathy, and this, more than anything, forms the crux of the book. He and his friends are distinct characters with their own idiosyncrasies. For all their excited companionship and adventures around the camp, though, what comes across most is their awareness of one another’s feelings. Although the novel has flaws—most notably a danger element put too easily out of mind, explored more as historical backstory than immediate threat—Ezekiel and the others are strong and likable enough characters to compensate. All told, middle-grade readers should approve.
A longish but high-spirited read with a powerful young hero.Pub Date: March 21, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-68433-251-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Black Rose Writing
Review Posted Online: March 18, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
PERSPECTIVES
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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