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THE MASK THAT SANG

Name: THE MASK THAT SANG
Author: Susan Currie
ISBN: 978-1-77260-013-1

by Susan Currie ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 6, 2016

Drawing on her own experience discovering her Cayuga identity, Currie offers a tender, resonant tale.

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Fifth-grader Cass Foster’s life is altered after her single mother receives an unexpected inheritance that includes a house in a better neighborhood and the relief of a new school where Cass can escape the bullies that have made her life miserable.

It is move-in day when the 12-year-old discovers a mysterious carved mask hidden in a drawer in her new bedroom. The mask has a hypnotizing effect on Cass, singing to her by day and making its way into her dreams at night. On her first day at her new school, Cass befriends classmate Degan Hill, a First Nations boy who also knows what it’s like to be bullied. She invites him over to show him the mask only to discover that her mother has pawned it. Devastated, Cass and Degan decide to retrieve the mask, which still speaks to Cass, who identifies as “nothing.” The two friends learn from Degan’s aunt, a Cayuga healer, that the mask is an Iroquois false face, a sacred object that’s found its way into Cass’ life for a reason. Currie offers a light, bittersweet story, filtered through the innocence of children, that comes full circle. She does this with an ease that is endearing and educational as she weaves in the traumatic story of the impact that the foster-care system has had and continues to have on Native families.

Drawing on her own experience discovering her Cayuga identity, Currie offers a tender, resonant tale. (Fiction. 9-13)

Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2016

ISBN: 978-1-77260-013-1

Page Count: 112

Publisher: Second Story Press

Review Posted Online: June 27, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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CLUES TO THE UNIVERSE

by Christina Li ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 12, 2021

Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.

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An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.

Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.

Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)

Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins

Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020

Categories:

CHILDREN'S FAMILY | CHILDREN'S SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

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NUMBER THE STARS

by Lois Lowry ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1989

A deftly told story that dramatizes how Danes appointed themselves bodyguards—not only for their king, who was in the habit...

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The author of the Anastasia books as well as more serious fiction (Rabble Starkey, 1987) offers her first historical fiction—a story about the escape of the Jews from Denmark in 1943.

Five years younger than Lisa in Carol Matas' Lisa's War (1989), Annemarie Johansen has, at 10, known three years of Nazi occupation. Though ever cautious and fearful of the ubiquitous soldiers, she is largely unaware of the extent of the danger around her; the Resistance kept even its participants safer by telling them as little as possible, and Annemarie has never been told that her older sister Lise died in its service. When the Germans plan to round up the Jews, the Johansens take in Annemarie's friend, Ellen Rosen, and pretend she is their daughter; later, they travel to Uncle Hendrik's house on the coast, where the Rosens and other Jews are transported by fishing boat to Sweden. Apart from Lise's offstage death, there is little violence here; like Annemarie, the reader is protected from the full implications of events—but will be caught up in the suspense and menace of several encounters with soldiers and in Annemarie's courageous run as courier on the night of the escape. The book concludes with the Jews' return, after the war, to homes well kept for them by their neighbors.

A deftly told story that dramatizes how Danes appointed themselves bodyguards—not only for their king, who was in the habit of riding alone in Copenhagen, but for their Jews. (Historical fiction. 9-12)