A Chinese American middle schooler struggles to adjust to life in an insular, mostly White town.
Sixth grader Evan Pao has a gut instinct for telling when things don’t add up and people are being less than honest. This proves useful when Evan, his divorced mother, and big sister relocate from California to the Virginia town where his Uncle Joe lives, fleeing a scandal involving his dad. Battlefield Elementary takes a lot of getting used to: Not only does Evan’s teacher, Mrs. Norwood, constantly talk about the Confederacy and local Civil War history, Evan is also the school’s only Asian American student. When class bully Brady asks if Evan has the “China virus,” he is rattled—and wonders if things will get even worse. Meanwhile, Mrs. Norwood implies that Evan shouldn’t take part in the annual school event celebrating the Civil War era because of his race. Evan surprises everyone when he researches and shares information about Chinese soldiers who fought on both sides during the Civil War. Shang’s compassionate prose alternates among multiple perspectives. Evan’s implied anxiety is sensitively portrayed, illustrating how hard it is to be the new kid in town, particularly if you stand out. The text’s empathy extends to Brady in ways that will encourage readers to pause before making snap judgments. The novel also handles with nuance questions about how uncomfortable history can be approached in classrooms and communities.
A thoughtful and timely read. (author’s note) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: June 7, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-338-67885-7
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2022
Categories: CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES
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Cooler-than-cool newcomer Styx Malone takes the more-sheltered brothers Caleb and Bobby Gene on a mischievous, path-altering, summer adventure of a lifetime as they embrace the extraordinary possibilities beyond the everyday in rural Indiana.
Readers may think an adventure such as they’ll find here wouldn’t be possible in the present day; this story takes place outside, where nature, know-how, creativity, and curiosity rule. Creeks, dirt roads, buried treasures, and more make up the landscape in Sutton, Indiana. Younger brother Caleb narrates, letting readers know from the outset that he’s tired of his dad’s racially tinged determination that they be safely ordinary: “I don’t want to be ordinary. I want to be…the other thing.” With Styx Malone around, Caleb and Bobby Gene will sure figure out what that “other thing” can become. The three black adolescents are enchanted with the miracle of the Great Escalator Trade, the mythic one-thing-leads-to-another bartering scheme that just might get them farther from Sutton than they’ve ever dreamed. As they get deeper and deeper into cahoots with Styx, they begin to notice that Styx harbors some secret ambitions of his own, further twisting this grand summer journey. “How do you move through the world knowing that you’re special, when no one else can see it?” begs the soul of this novel.
Heartening and hopeful, a love letter to black male youth grasping the desires within them, absorbing the worlds around them, striving to be more otherwise than ordinary. Please share. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5247-1595-3
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Wendy Lamb/Random
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
Categories: CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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A successful juvenile by the beloved New Yorker writer portrays a farm episode with an imaginative twist that makes a poignant, humorous story of a pig, a spider and a little girl.
Young Fern Arable pleads for the life of runt piglet Wilbur and gets her father to sell him to a neighbor, Mr. Zuckerman. Daily, Fern visits the Zuckermans to sit and muse with Wilbur and with the clever pen spider Charlotte, who befriends him when he is lonely and downcast. At the news of Wilbur's forthcoming slaughter, campaigning Charlotte, to the astonishment of people for miles around, spins words in her web. "Some Pig" comes first. Then "Terrific"—then "Radiant". The last word, when Wilbur is about to win a show prize and Charlotte is about to die from building her egg sac, is "Humble". And as the wonderful Charlotte does die, the sadness is tempered by the promise of more spiders next spring.
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often informative as amusing, and the whole tenor of appealing wit and pathos will make fine entertainment for reading aloud, too.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1952
ISBN: 978-0-06-026385-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1952
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES
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