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MARTIN FINDS A WAY

Name: MARTIN FINDS A WAY
Author: T.H. Marshall
ISBN: 978-1-4867-0944-1

by T.H. Marshall ; illustrated by Katarryna Bukiert ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 18, 2016

Mundane illustrations aside, this extended play on words is likely to spark both discussion and rumination.

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A traveler finds many Ways to follow and to share before finding one of his own.

Setting out over autumnal fields that give way to urban and even nautical settings, a “really nice kid named Martin” finds one Way after another. He meets a friend who is stuck and in need of a “new Way” and another, who has a “different Way” and invites him along to explore. As he finds more Ways, Martin comes to realize that each is unique, that all are good, that there is no right Way or wrong Way. Ultimately he finds “the Way that was right for him.” Marshall really milks the metaphor, but there’s still a little juice left—particularly in the observation that the “right Way” for some is “no Way.” (In the accompanying picture, which is equally ambiguous, Martin stands on a precipice gazing into the starry cosmos.) Broadly inclusive as Marshall’s philosophy may be, Bukiert gives it a parochial cast by depicting Martin and the people he meets as mostly light of skin and western European in dress and features. Adding visual appeal but not much depth to the central conceit, the illustrations depict the Ways as abstract ribbons that loop through each scene and can be walked on, followed, or picked up and carried along.

Mundane illustrations aside, this extended play on words is likely to spark both discussion and rumination. (Picture book. 10-13)

Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2016

ISBN: 978-1-4867-0944-1

Page Count: 32

Publisher: Flowerpot Press

Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

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A YEAR DOWN YONDER

From the Grandma Dowdel series , Vol. 2

by Richard Peck ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2000

Year-round fun.

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Set in 1937 during the so-called “Roosevelt recession,” tight times compel Mary Alice, a Chicago girl, to move in with her grandmother, who lives in a tiny Illinois town so behind the times that it doesn’t “even have a picture show.”

This winning sequel takes place several years after A Long Way From Chicago (1998) leaves off, once again introducing the reader to Mary Alice, now 15, and her Grandma Dowdel, an indomitable, idiosyncratic woman who despite her hard-as-nails exterior is able to see her granddaughter with “eyes in the back of her heart.” Peck’s slice-of-life novel doesn’t have much in the way of a sustained plot; it could almost be a series of short stories strung together, but the narrative never flags, and the book, populated with distinctive, soulful characters who run the gamut from crazy to conventional, holds the reader’s interest throughout. And the vignettes, some involving a persnickety Grandma acting nasty while accomplishing a kindness, others in which she deflates an overblown ego or deals with a petty rivalry, are original and wildly funny. The arena may be a small hick town, but the battle for domination over that tiny turf is fierce, and Grandma Dowdel is a canny player for whom losing isn’t an option. The first-person narration is infused with rich, colorful language—“She was skinnier than a toothpick with termites”—and Mary Alice’s shrewd, prickly observations: “Anybody who thinks small towns are friendlier than big cities lives in a big city.”

Year-round fun. (Fiction. 11-13)

Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2000

ISBN: 978-0-8037-2518-8

Page Count: 144

Publisher: Dial Books

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2000

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

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GIRL'S BEST FRIEND

From the Maggie Brooklyn Mysteries series

by Leslie Margolis ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2010

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In this series debut, Maggie Sinclair tracks down a dognapper and solves a mystery about the noises in the walls of her Brooklyn brownstone apartment building. The 12-year-old heroine, who shares a middle name—Brooklyn—with her twin brother, Finn, is juggling two dogwalking jobs she’s keeping secret from her parents, and somehow she attracts the ire of the dogs’ former walker. Maggie tells her story in the first person—she’s self-possessed and likable, even when her clueless brother invites her ex–best friend, now something of an enemy, to their shared 12th birthday party. Maggie’s attention to details helps her to figure out why dogs seem to be disappearing and why there seem to be mice in the walls of her building, though astute readers will pick up on the solution to at least one mystery before Maggie solves it. There’s a brief nod to Nancy Drew, but the real tensions in this contemporary preteen story are more about friendship and boy crushes than skullduggery. Still, the setting is appealing, and Maggie is a smart and competent heroine whose personal life is just as interesting as—if not more than—her detective work. (Mystery. 10-13)