Irish narrator Mags has moved to a new town after her father’s death. Talented Gillian, who practices violin in the woods Mags explores, can’t seem to find her own dad. An aspiring writer at age 11, Mags ostensibly crafts this dual-voiced novel, giving herself the longer, cleverer bits. Mags hatches a plan to find Gillian’s recalcitrant father and tap him for the money Gillian needs to audition at a renowned London music school. Parkinson portrays a fresh, feisty heroine in Mags, whose “Project Manhunt”—far more intriguing to her than Gillian—is an unconscious stab at reconciling her father’s death. There are poignant, funny passages as Mags, her mother, grandfather and even Mum’s new friend, Don, approach that reconciliation. Gillian and her family, eccentric and disconnected, contrast thinly and sadly with Mags’s own. The dénouement—wherein Mags tracks Gillian’s dad to his apartment in the next town—doesn’t quite equal the setup, a fact that can’t be pinned on the budding fictive author. An often-touching exploration of the variant ties between friends, and in families. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: April 1, 2007
ISBN: 1-59643-122-9
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2007
A beautifully rendered setting enfolds a disappointing plot.
In sixth grade, Izzy Mancini’s cozy, loving world falls apart.
She and her family have moved out of the cottage she grew up in. Her mother has spent the summer on Block Island instead of at home with Izzy. Her father has recently returned from military service in Afghanistan partially paralyzed and traumatized. The only people she can count on are Zelda and Piper, her best friends since kindergarten—that is, until the Haidary family moves into the upstairs apartment. At first, Izzy resents the new guests from Afghanistan even though she knows she should be grateful that Dr. Haidary saved her father’s life. But despite her initial resistance (which manifests at times as racism), as Izzy gets to know Sitara, the Haidarys’ daughter, she starts to question whether Zelda and Piper really are her friends for forever—and whether she has the courage to stand up for Sitara against the people she loves. Ferruolo weaves a rich setting, fully immersing readers in the largely white, coastal town of Seabury, Rhode Island. Disappointingly, the story resolves when Izzy convinces her classmates to accept Sitara by revealing the Haidarys’ past as American allies, a position that put them in so much danger that they had to leave home. The idea that Sitara should be embraced only because her family supported America, rather than simply because she is a human being, significantly undermines the purported message of tolerance for all.
A beautifully rendered setting enfolds a disappointing plot. (Fiction. 10-12)Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-374-30909-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
There is something profoundly elemental going on in Smalls’s book: the capturing of a moment of unmediated joy. It’s not melodramatic, but just a Saturday in which an African-American father and son immerse themselves in each other’s company when the woman of the house is away. Putting first things first, they tidy up the house, with an unheralded sense of purpose motivating their actions: “Then we clean, clean, clean the windows,/wipe, wipe, wash them right./My dad shines in the windows’ light.” When their work is done, they head for the park for some batting practice, then to the movies where the boy gets to choose between films. After a snack, they work their way homeward, racing each other, doing a dance step or two, then “Dad takes my hand and slows down./I understand, and we slow down./It’s a long, long walk./We have a quiet talk and smile.” Smalls treats the material without pretense, leaving it guileless and thus accessible to readers. Hays’s artwork is wistful and idyllic, just as this day is for one small boy. (Picture book. 5-8)
Pub Date: April 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-316-79899-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1999
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