Thirteen-year-old Firebird Tucker lives with her father, grandmother and twin brother in a swamp—a magical, spooky wilderness endangered by the growth of the nearby city and rising waters. The father, Trapper, is a legendary eel catcher, and the eerie, other-worldly swamp feels like a diminished version of Jody Baxter’s Florida home in The Yearling and, as in The Great Gatsby, a billboard presides over all. The billboard is the border of their world and its message to “Live Your Dreams” tempts Firebird to leave her circumscribed, endangered world. Only at the end of this quiet tale about roots versus dreams is the tone jarred a bit by an over-the-top action sequence, but this is a memorable story rooted in a unique setting, with a character to care about, as Firebird finds out secrets of her past and sets out to make her way in a new world. (Fiction. 11-15)
Pub Date: June 1, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-15-205983-5
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2007
BOOK REVIEW
PLB 0-7868-2389-5 From Griffin (The Other Shepards, 1998, etc.), a poignant, perceptive tale of a teenager on a self-destructive spiral, seen through the eyes of his younger, more grounded stepbrother. Written as a monologue Ben addresses to his older stepbrother Dustin (“I never met anyone with less need for people than you, but not needing isn’t the same as not touching”), the story develops around the last time the two boys meet, in a hospital room after Dustin’s latest semi-intentional accident, and concludes with a memorial after Dustin ends his life. Through Ben’s second-person narration, readers learn how Dustin never recovered from his mother’s death from cancer, and how he behaved with unalloyed hostility when his father, Lyle, met and married Gina, mother of Ben. Gina, ever-restless and irresponsible, eventually moves on, and Dustin is the one who follows her across the country, while Ben stays behind, more comfortable with Lyle’s roots and boundaries. Ben comes off as a sharp, strong-minded observer, aware of what makes the people around him tick, and with a gift for pinpointing the traits and attitudes on which relationships are founded or founder. Thoughtful readers will appreciate his insight, enjoy the ringside seat as restrained, rational Lyle meets Mallory, a flamboyant, take-charge TV personality, and come to understand both the dangers and the appeal of Dustin’s choices. (Fiction. 11-13)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-7868-0440-8
Page Count: 159
Publisher: Hyperion
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1999
Setting the story in the early 1950s, Hamilton has penned a slow-moving but ultimately touching character study about a boy learning to love his new stepfather. Dal Wilkins is 11 and really can’t remember his father, a soldier killed in WWII. His mother has married a jovial, kind man whom Dal calls “Mr. Sabatini.” Dal accompanies Mr. Sabatini on a trip to Idaho; expecting to find the Wild West, Dal instead spends his summer in a tiny, sleepy town. He works in bean fields, goes to barbecues, works up an attraction to Patty Puckett, goes swimming, and spends some strained days with the Dunns, a family of farmers whom Patty ridicules. Patty’s ne’er-do-well father, Len, claims to own a uranium mine, however, and Mr. Sabatini decides to invest. When Mr. Sabatini is bitten by a rattlesnake on a trip to the mine, Dal must summon the same courage his own father and Mr. Sabatini drew upon during the war. He drives to town through the nearly roadless desert, saves his stepfather’s life, and finds that he has a family stronger in love than that found in the Dunn or Puckett brood. This beautifully crafted book, long on plot, feeling, and suspense, features protagonists that are drawn with realism and depth. (Fiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-688-16814-0
Page Count: 154
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1999
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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