A budding filmmaker finds opportunity and mystery on a camping trip with his family.
Spencer is on a camping trip with his developmentally delayed younger brother, Bunny, and their mildly mysterious grandfather David. Spencer gets caught up with War of 1812 re-enactors who are being filmed by a group of college students. Since he has a growing interest in moviemaking, the whole process is very appealing for Spencer. The college students take him on as an assistant, a duty Spencer must balance against trying to figure out where his wily brother has disappeared to. Although hints to that mystery abound, ultimately they come to nothing at all; either Bunny isn’t missing, or it doesn’t matter that he is. (Bunny tells his own version of this camping trip in companion novel Weerdest Day Ever!, by Richard Scrimger.) A secondary issue is that one re-enactor seems to be hatching a scheme that perhaps reveals yet another mystery about David. Spencer’s voice is authentic and amusing, but the mystery is never especially compelling. While Staunton spun perfectly fine mysteries starring an older Spencer in Jump Cut (2012) and Coda (2014), he seems particularly hamstrung by the necessity of writing for a younger audience, with the result that the plot fizzles.
An average mystery for an uncertain audience. (Mystery. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4598-1161-4
Page Count: 168
Publisher: Orca
Review Posted Online: July 2, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
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Basketball is life in Lorain, Ohio.
A group of seventh graders have different reasons for joining Hoop Group, an elite youth basketball program. Jayden, who lives in a tiny, cramped house with his mother and grandmother, desperately needs the money playing for the NBA would bring. Chris’ uncle made it out of Lorain and into the NBA, but he doesn’t share his uncle’s skills and can’t quite live up to his father’s expectations. Tamika’s dad was Hoop Group’s coach before Parkinson’s disease put the team’s future in jeopardy; she has a lot to prove and dreams of being the next Pat Summitt. Dex and his hardworking single mom are struggling with poverty, but he just loves the game––especially the Cleveland Cavs. And Anthony, frankly, doesn’t have much of a choice; it was either join this character-building group or face expulsion from school. A makeshift team of preteens with a lot on their plates, they discover as much about themselves (and one another) off the court as they do on it. The authors present a convincing argument about the value of basketball beyond points on the board and big contracts. The characters’ dreams are relatable along with the book’s universally valuable emphasis on hard work and perseverance. But the specifics about what it takes to make it in basketball and the fast-paced on-court action provide something special for young fans of the game. Main characters read as Black.
An inspiring sports story all the way to the buzzer. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Aug. 31, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-297109-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 8, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2021
Categories: CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S ENTERTAINMENT & SPORTS
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BOOK REVIEW
Parallel storylines take readers through the lives of two young people on Sept. 11 in 2001 and 2019.
In the contemporary timeline, Reshmina is an Afghan girl living in foothills near the Pakistan border that are a battleground between the Taliban and U.S. armed forces. She is keen to improve her English while her twin brother, Pasoon, is inspired by the Taliban and wants to avenge their older sister, killed by an American bomb on her wedding day. Reshmina helps a wounded American soldier, making her village a Taliban target. In 2001, Brandon Chavez is spending the day with his father, who works at the World Trade Center’s Windows on the World restaurant. Brandon is heading to the underground mall when a plane piloted by al-Qaida hits the tower, and his father is among those killed. The two storylines develop in parallel through alternating chapters. Gratz’s deeply moving writing paints vivid images of the loss and fear of those who lived through the trauma of 9/11. However, this nuance doesn’t extend to the Afghan characters; Reshmina and Pasoon feel one-dimensional. Descriptions of the Taliban’s Afghan victims and Reshmina's gentle father notwithstanding, references to all young men eventually joining the Taliban and Pasoon's zeal for their cause counteract this messaging. Explanations for the U.S. military invasion of Afghanistan in the author’s note and in characters’ conversations too simplistically present the U.S. presence.
Falters in its oversimplified portrayal of a complicated region and people. (author’s note) (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-338-24575-2
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 15, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2021
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