by Sherri Winston ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 6, 2018
Thought-provoking and smart and a great springboard for discussions on race and class.
Brianna Justice wants nothing more than to be a star reporter.
The president of her sixth-grade class at Blueberry Hills Middle School, this young, African-American student always gets what she goes after—most of the time. Her overzealousness to be mentored by her favorite TV news reporter backfires and lands her instead with a newspaper journalist. As her first assignment, he has her cover a SheCodes program at Price Academy. Brianna frets over this seemingly lackluster assignment because the school is located in what she believes to be a “shady neighborhood” on Detroit’s east side. From the first, Brianna wrestles with self-consciousness over her financial privilege and with her own stereotypes about the African-American students at Price. She comes to realize that using the word “ghetto” to describe the kids she meets there is not only derogatory, but it also deflects attention from the real issues of poverty and lack of opportunity within that community. This perceptive tale about how a young girl grapples with the diversity of conditions within her own racial demographic trusts its readers with weighty material. Winston does an excellent job highlighting the complex race issues that African-American children face. Though her father and grandfather tell her not to use the word “ghetto,” it is her white mentor who schools Brianna on the history of the word, and this is when the use of the word finally sinks in for her.
Thought-provoking and smart and a great springboard for discussions on race and class. (Fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: March 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-316-50528-4
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2018
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by Johnnie Christmas ; illustrated by Johnnie Christmas ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 17, 2022
Problem-solving through perseverance and friendship is the real win in this deeply smart and inspiring story.
Leaving Brooklyn behind, Black math-whiz and puzzle lover Bree starts a new life in Florida, where she’ll be tossed into the deep end in more ways than one. Keeping her head above water may be the trickiest puzzle yet.
While her dad is busy working and training in IT, Bree struggles at first to settle into Enith Brigitha Middle School, largely due to the school’s preoccupation with swimming—from the accomplishments of its namesake, a Black Olympian from Curaçao, to its near victory at the state swimming championships. But Bree can’t swim. To illustrate her anxiety around this fact, the graphic novel’s bright colors give way to gray thought bubbles with thick, darkened outlines expressing Bree’s deepest fears and doubts. This poignant visual crowds some panels just as anxious feelings can crowd the thoughts of otherwise star students like Bree. Ultimately, learning to swim turns out to be easy enough with the help of a kind older neighbor—a Black woman with a competitive swimming past of her own as well as a rich and bittersweet understanding of Black Americans’ relationship with swimming—who explains to Bree how racist obstacles of the past can become collective anxiety in the present. To her surprise, Bree, with her newfound water skills, eventually finds herself on the school’s swim team, navigating competition, her anxiety, and new, meaningful relationships.
Problem-solving through perseverance and friendship is the real win in this deeply smart and inspiring story. (Graphic fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: May 17, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-06-305677-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: HarperAlley
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2022
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by Varsha Bajaj ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 27, 2019
The novel’s dryness is mitigated in part by its exploration of immigrant identity, xenophobia, and hate crimes.
Seventh graders Karina Chopra and Chris Daniels live in Houston, Texas, and although they are next-door neighbors, they have different interests and their paths rarely cross.
In fact, Karina, whose family is Indian, doesn’t want to be friends with Chris, whose family is white, because the boys he hangs out with are mean to her. Things change when Karina’s immigrant paternal grandfather, Papa, moves in with Karina’s family. Papa begins tutoring Chris in math, and, as a result, Chris and Karina begin spending time with each other. Karina even comes to realize that Chris is not at all like the rest of his friends and that she should give him a second chance. One day, when Karina, Papa, and Chris are walking home from school, something terrible happens: They are assaulted by a stranger who calls Papa a Muslim terrorist, and he is badly injured. The children find themselves wanting to speak out for Papa and for other first-generation Americans like him. Narrated by Karina and Chris in alternate chapters, Bajaj’s novel gives readers varied and valuable perspectives of what it means to be first- and third-generation Indian Americans in an increasingly diverse nation. Unfortunately, however, Bajaj’s characters are quite bland, and the present-tense narrative voices of the preteen protagonists lack both distinction and authenticity.
The novel’s dryness is mitigated in part by its exploration of immigrant identity, xenophobia, and hate crimes. (Fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: Aug. 27, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-525-51724-5
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: May 25, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019
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by Varsha Bajaj ; illustrated by Simona Mulazzani
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by Varsha Bajaj ; illustrated by Eliza Wheeler
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