At the height of the Depression, when it seemed capitalism had failed, “Karelian fever” spread among Finnish-American communities in the northern US and Canada. Attracted by a sense of adventure and the dream of creating an independent Finnish republic in Russia, six thousand North American Finns migrated. Jake Maki’s father, a socialist blacklisted for joining the IWW union, moves his family to Russia, but conditions in Russia are terrible. Then Stalin’s purges begin, and the “Red broom” of totalitarianism sweeps away all who might oppose the Communist Party. Friends start disappearing, and Jake’s older brother and father are arrested. Jake, his little sister Maija, and his mother are aided in a thrilling escape, skiing north to Finland. Taking a little-known historical event for its context, Durbin’s historical fiction is every bit as exciting as the best adventure tale, as Jake must prove his sisu, the Finnish word for intelligence and courage that allows one to survive. Readers will learn an important side of 20th-century history as they root for Jake. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-439-37307-7
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Orchard/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2004
PLB 0-06-028386-6 In a story based on real events, and told in poems, Sones explores what happened and how she reacted when her adored older sister suddenly began screaming and hearing voices in her head, and was ultimately hospitalized. Individually, the poems appear simple and unremarkable, snapshot portraits of two sisters, a family, unfaithful friends, and a sweet first love. Collected, they take on life and movement, the individual frames of a movie that in the unspooling become animated, telling a compelling tale and presenting a painful passage through young adolescence. The form, a story-in-poems, fits the story remarkably well, spotlighting the musings of the 13-year-old narrator, and pinpointing the emotions powerfully. She copes with friends who snub her, worries that she, too, will go mad, and watches her sister’s slow recovery. To a budding genre that includes Karen Hesse’s Out of the Dust (1997) and Virginia Euwer Wolff’s Make Lemonade (1993), this book is a welcome addition. (Poetry. 10-14)
Pub Date: Oct. 31, 1999
ISBN: 0-06-028387-4
Page Count: 220
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1999
Couloumbis’s debut carries a family through early stages of grief with grace, sensitivity, and a healthy dose of laughter. In the wake of Baby’s sudden death, the three Deans remaining put up no resistance when Aunt Patty swoops in to take away 12-year-old Willa Jo and suddenly, stubbornly mute JoAnn, called “Little Sister,” in the misguided belief that their mother needs time alone. Well-meaning but far too accustomed to getting her way, Aunt Patty buys the children unwanted new clothes, enrolls them in a Bible day camp for one disastrous day, and even tries to line up friends for them. While politely tolerating her hovering, the two inseparable sisters find their own path, hooking up with a fearless, wonderfully plainspoken teenaged neighbor and her dirt-loving brothers, then, acting on an obscure but ultimately healing impulse, climbing out onto the roof to get a bit closer to Heaven, and Baby. Willa Jo tells the tale in a nonlinear, back-and-forth fashion that not only prepares readers emotionally for her heartrending account of Baby’s death, but also artfully illuminates each character’s depths and foibles; the loving relationship between Patty and her wiser husband Hob is just as complex and clearly drawn as that of Willa Jo and Little Sister. Lightening the tone by poking gentle fun at Patty and some of her small-town neighbors, the author creates a cast founded on likable, real-seeming people who grow and change in response to tragedy. (Fiction. 11-13)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-399-23389-X
Page Count: 211
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1999
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