An accessible but lackluster tribute to Black families who were in constant search of dignity.
A first-person coming-of-age tale set in 1961 that follows a preteen and his family as they become the first Black people in an all-white neighborhood.
Inquisitive 12-year-old Samuel Cole and his parents have lived in the same modest cottage in Los Angeles since his birth. Originally from Oklahoma, the couple embraces the idea of the “New Frontier,” a term used by then–presidential nominee John F. Kennedy, and they strategize ways to seek a better life, starting with purchasing a new home. Despite encountering obstacles, a year later they succeed, but that means leaving behind a tight-knit community. Samuel hates how eerily sterile his new neighborhood is: “Everything [is] amazingly clean…[Does] anyone even live here?” His reservations turn out to be well founded; the family members experience racist torments, including the vandalization of their car with a racial slur soon after they move in. In the midst of his new normal, Samuel makes friends with Patsy McGuire, a white girl who eventually helps with uncovering a neighborhood secret. Wilson infuses the story with moments of levity and occasionally charming dialogue, but the writing overall feels dated, and the execution is uneven. The author also ties history into this well-intentioned story, touching on the inner lives of Black people who believed in promised new beginnings during the tail end of the Great Migration.
An accessible but lackluster tribute to Black families who were in constant search of dignity. (publisher’s note) (Historical fiction. 12-14)Pub Date: May 14, 2024
ISBN: 9781951122874
Page Count: 260
Publisher: Kinkajou/Artemesia
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2024
Stands out neither as a folk-tale retelling, a coming-of-age story, nor a Holocaust novel.
A Holocaust tale with a thin “Hansel and Gretel” veneer from the author of The Devil’s Arithmetic (1988).
Chaim and Gittel, 14-year-old twins, live with their parents in the Lodz ghetto, forced from their comfortable country home by the Nazis. The siblings are close, sharing a sign-based twin language; Chaim stutters and communicates primarily with his sister. Though slowly starving, they make the best of things with their beloved parents, although it’s more difficult once they must share their tiny flat with an unpleasant interfaith couple and their Mischling (half-Jewish) children. When the family hears of their impending “wedding invitation”—the ghetto idiom for a forthcoming order for transport—they plan a dangerous escape. Their journey is difficult, and one by one, the adults vanish. Ultimately the children end up in a fictional child labor camp, making ammunition for the German war effort. Their story effectively evokes the dehumanizing nature of unremitting silence. Nevertheless, the dense, distancing narrative (told in a third-person contemporaneous narration focused through Chaim with interspersed snippets from Gittel’s several-decades-later perspective) has several consistency problems, mostly regarding the relative religiosity of this nominally secular family. One theme seems to be frustration with those who didn’t fight back against overwhelming odds, which makes for a confusing judgment on the suffering child protagonists.
Stands out neither as a folk-tale retelling, a coming-of-age story, nor a Holocaust novel. (author’s note) (Historical fiction. 12-14)Pub Date: March 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-399-25778-0
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: Dec. 20, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2018
Nineteenth-century tomboy Louisa Cosgrove wants to study medicine, but after her indulgent father's death, that dream seems impossibly distant. Her mother dispatches her to family friends, but Louisa never arrives. Instead, she is taken to Wildthorn Hall, an insane asylum. The staff insist her name is Lucy Childs, and her treatment ranges from the relatively benign (tranquilizers) to the horrific (sensory deprivation). The mystery of Louisa's incarceration is revealed through alternating chapters of her present and childhood: Like many of her fellow "patients," Louisa's been committed for being a troublesome woman. Luckily, her family doesn't know of those tendencies that would make her utterly irredeemable—her overly fond feelings for her beautiful cousin Grace. Unlike many of the other inmates, who seem to develop mental illness from the cruelty of their surroundings, Louisa is determined to escape, perhaps with the help of a lovely asylum employee, Eliza. Despite a too-pat ending, Louisa and Eliza provide a window into a shameful history of mental health care and women's incarceration that only ended in living memory. (Historical fiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-547-37017-0
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 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.
