by Richard Scrimger ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 20, 2016
An unconventional narrator steals the show.
A missing sword, a cow, a one-armed man, and a first crush all combine to make this camping trip the weerdest ever.
Brothers Bunny and Spencer accompany their grandfather to a re-enactment of the Battle of Beaver Dams from the War of 1812. Bunny, seeing the armies preparing for battle, mistakenly believes that a real war between Canada and the United States is imminent. When someone steals Tecumseth’s sword on the night before the battle, it is up to Bunny and his new friends, siblings Tyler and Beth, to find it. Without it, the leader of the First Nations confederacy will be unable to lead the Canadians to victory. Narrator Bunny’s learning disability means that his essay about the camping trip, which makes up the novel’s text, is full of misunderstandings and misspellings. However, his simple assessments of war, bullying, and controlling one’s emotions are wise. The white boy’s acceptance of diversity in others is equally noteworthy. He describes Beth as having “brown [skin] like wet toffee”; Tyler, who never speaks, is darker. When Beth, part Mohawk, calls herself an Indian, Bunny thinks to himself, “Indians are from India.…I didnt think Beth was from India but I wasnt going to tell her what she culd call herself.” American readers unfamiliar with this event in history will likely still be unclear after Bunny’s fractured retelling, but Bunny’s personality and voice will carry them along.
An unconventional narrator steals the show. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4598-1155-3
Page Count: 216
Publisher: Orca
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2016
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by Marthe Jocelyn ; Richard Scrimger ; illustrated by Claudia Dávila
by Annie Matthew ; developed by Kobe Bryant ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 24, 2021
A worthy combination of athletic action, the virtues of inner strength, and the importance of friendship.
A young tennis champion becomes the target of revenge.
In this sequel to Legacy and the Queen (2019), Legacy Petrin and her friends Javi and Pippa have returned to Legacy’s home province and the orphanage run by her father. With her friends’ help, she is in training to defend her championship when they discover that another player, operating under the protection of High Consul Silla, is presenting herself as Legacy. She is so convincing that the real Legacy is accused of being an imitation. False Legacy has become a hero to the masses, further strengthening Silla’s hold, and it becomes imperative to uncover and defeat her. If Legacy is to win again, she must play her imposter while disguised as someone else. Winning at tennis is not just about money and fame, but resisting Silla’s plans to send more young people into brutal mines with little hope of better lives. Legacy will have to overcome her fears and find the magic that allowed her to claim victory in the past. This story, with its elements of sports, fantasy, and social consciousness that highlight tensions between the powerful and those they prey upon, successfully continues the series conceived by late basketball superstar Bryant. As before, the tennis matches are depicted with pace and spirit. Legacy and Javi have brown skin; most other characters default to White.
A worthy combination of athletic action, the virtues of inner strength, and the importance of friendship. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-949520-19-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Granity Studios
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
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by Annie Matthew ; developed by Kobe Bryant
by Augusta Scattergood ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 2012
Though occasionally heavy-handed, this debut offers a vivid glimpse of the 1960s South through the eyes of a spirited girl...
The closing of her favorite swimming pool opens 11-year-old Gloriana Hemphill’s eyes to the ugliness of racism in a small Mississippi town in 1964.
Glory can’t believe it… the Hanging Moss Community Pool is closing right before her July Fourth birthday. Not only that, she finds out the closure’s not for the claimed repairs needed, but so Negroes can’t swim there. Tensions have been building since “Freedom Workers” from the North started shaking up status quo, and Glory finds herself embroiled in it when her new, white friend from Ohio boldly drinks from the “Colored Only” fountain. The Hemphills’ African-American maid, Emma, a mother figure to Glory and her sister Jesslyn, tells her, “Don’t be worrying about what you can’t fix, Glory honey.” But Glory does, becoming an activist herself when she writes an indignant letter to the newspaper likening “hateful prejudice” to “dog doo” that makes her preacher papa proud. When she’s not saving the world, reading Nancy Drew or eating Dreamsicles, Glory shares the heartache of being the kid sister of a preoccupied teenager, friendship gone awry and the terrible cost of blabbing people’s secrets… mostly in a humorously sassy first-person voice.
Though occasionally heavy-handed, this debut offers a vivid glimpse of the 1960s South through the eyes of a spirited girl who takes a stand. (Historical fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-545-33180-7
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2011
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