An engaging and sympathetic exploration of a girl’s struggles with mental illness and recovery.
As she enters the sixth grade, a girl spirals downward and searches for answers in this debut middle-grade novel.
With her fifth grade year ending, Sarah is looking forward to summer and her Massachusetts family’s annual trip to Cape Cod, although she’s worried about starting middle school in the fall. No matter how hard she tries, Sarah can’t seem to earn good grades. She is constantly getting dinged by her teachers and parents. They say she doesn’t make an effort or work well with others; she’s disruptive, distracted, and immature. Creativity has been her mainstay, but even that has been lessened by her art teacher’s criticism. She wishes she could be normal but acts out in ways that puzzle even her. At Girl Scout camp, for example, she wakes after a nighttime walk far from her tent, dazed and screaming. As sixth grade begins, the almost-friendless girl experiences fresh disasters, constantly disappointing her teachers and parents and becoming seriously depressed; she fantasizes about swimming away like a mermaid and disappearing from her life. When she reaches out to a teacher she trusts, Sarah at last receives professional help, a diagnosis, and a support system. Though she knows it won’t be fast or easy, she’s relieved to have more control. In her book, Read offers a realistic portrayal of mental illness as Sarah grapples painfully with trying to manage something she doesn’t understand. As the narrator, Sarah can become overly repetitive and maudlin; it’s understandable and does convey her stuck state of mind, but readers may find themselves getting impatient. Things pick up with Sarah’s diagnosis, bringing her experiences into focus. The novel provides clear, useful information about Sarah’s condition and its management, including ongoing help from a treatment team and her parents’ involvement.
An engaging and sympathetic exploration of a girl’s struggles with mental illness and recovery.Pub Date: Aug. 31, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-64-228036-4
Page Count: 260
Publisher: Izzard Ink
Review Posted Online: May 6, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel.
Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment.
Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. To start, in an alternate ending to the previous episode, Principal Krupp ends up in prison (“…a lot like being a student at Jerome Horwitz Elementary School, except that the prison had better funding”). There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). The villain sets off after George and Harold, who are in juvie (“not much different from our old school…except that they have library books here.”). Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. George and Harold link up in kindergarten to reduce a quartet of vicious bullies to giggling insanity with a relentless series of pranks involving shaving cream, spiders, effeminate spoof text messages and friendship bracelets. Pilkey tucks both topical jokes and bathroom humor into the cartoon art, and ups the narrative’s lexical ante with terms like “pharmaceuticals” and “theatrical flair.” Unfortunately, the bullies’ sad fates force Krupp to resign, so he’s not around to save the Earth from being destroyed later on by Talking Toilets and other invaders…
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-545-17534-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
