A sincere story of caring and community in the face of family struggles.
Georgia is given Freddy, a bearded dragon, as a pet by her mother, Blythe, who abandons her that very same day.
Blythe runs away with her boyfriend, Lyle, leaving Georgia with her quiet, devoted father, Stanley. Georgia, 11, longs for Blythe to return—and makes Freddy a proxy for her mother’s love, vowing to do her best for him. Georgia’s life is further upended when a larger-than-life boy arrives in their small Maine town, a foster child taken in by a highly religious family. Roly’s acquaintance with Georgia and her best friend, Maria, begins after he steals a cat collar from the pet store. Despite witnessing this shocking event, the girls become good friends with him, and the three find a secret refuge in the woods, a glass house that ultimately becomes a danger zone. Strong friendships, parental love (and neglect), and resilient children feature in this slice-of-contemporary-small-town life. Georgia copes with her situation through help from peers and sympathetic adult friends (Maria’s paternal grandmother plays an important role, giving Georgia loving advice). This is a realistic, sometimes humorous, sometimes sad family story; while Blythe has problems with alcohol, both Stanley and Lyle turn out to be good fathers. The book follows a White default for most characters; Maria is Mexican American.
A sincere story of caring and community in the face of family struggles. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-5344-7519-9
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A real gem.
A 10-year old girl learns to adjust to a strange town, makes some fascinating friends, and fills the empty space in her heart thanks to a big old stray dog in this lyrical, moving, and enchanting book by a fresh new voice.
India Opal’s mama left when she was only three, and her father, “the preacher,” is absorbed in his own loss and in the work of his new ministry at the Open-Arms Baptist Church of Naomi [Florida]. Enter Winn-Dixie, a dog who “looked like a big piece of old brown carpet that had been left out in the rain.” But, this dog had a grin “so big that it made him sneeze.” And, as Opal says, “It’s hard not to immediately fall in love with a dog who has a good sense of humor.” Because of Winn-Dixie, Opal meets Miss Franny Block, an elderly lady whose papa built her a library of her own when she was just a little girl and she’s been the librarian ever since. Then, there’s nearly blind Gloria Dump, who hangs the empty bottle wreckage of her past from the mistake tree in her back yard. And, Otis, oh yes, Otis, whose music charms the gerbils, rabbits, snakes and lizards he’s let out of their cages in the pet store. Brush strokes of magical realism elevate this beyond a simple story of friendship to a well-crafted tale of community and fellowship, of sweetness, sorrow and hope. And, it’s funny, too.
A real gem. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: March 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0776-2
Page Count: 182
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2000
SEEN & HEARD
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