This sequel to 1973 Newbery Medal-winning Julie of the Wolves continues the story of Julie Edwards Miyax Kapugen, the girl who traveled across the tundra with her adoptive wolf pack. Miyax is now living in Kangik village with her father, Kapugen, and his gussak (white) wife, Ellen. Although initially uncomfortable with her new stepmother, Miyax comes to trust and—after they spend several days together in a makeshift shelter during a raging snowstorm- -love her. Peter, a Siberian Eskimo who was adopted by a couple in Kangik, has made his intentions toward Miyax known, intentions that Miyax, nearly 15, finds very pleasant. She forgives her father for killing Amaroq, her wolf leader, and tries to understand the desperation that forced him to do it. The one shadow that looms over Miyax is the knowledge that Kapugen will not hesitate to shoot more of her beloved wolves if they again threaten the uminmaks, or musk oxen, that he is raising as part of the village's cooperative industry. Miyax goes again to the wolves to lead them away from the oxen and Kapugen. But they return, and their fate depends on whether Miyax can prove to her father what he once knew but seems to have forgotten: that Eskimos and animals must coexist as friends. Interesting Eskimo village lore, and more lupine detail, but the unifying theme here—Miyax saving the wolves—is not nearly as arresting as the original. (Fiction. 10+)
Pub Date: Sept. 30, 1994
ISBN: 0-06-023528-4
Page Count: 240
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1994
A world-class charmer, Clements (The Janitor’s Boy, 2000, etc.) woos aspiring young authors—as well as grown up publishers, editors, agents, parents, teachers, and even reviewers—with this tongue-in-cheek tale of a 12-year-old novelist’s triumphant debut. Sparked by a chance comment of her mother’s, a harried assistant editor for a (surely fictional) children’s imprint, Natalie draws on deep reserves of feeling and writing talent to create a moving story about a troubled schoolgirl and her father. First, it moves her pushy friend Zoe, who decides that it has to be published; then it moves a timorous, second-year English teacher into helping Zoe set up a virtual literary agency; then, submitted pseudonymously, it moves Natalie’s unsuspecting mother into peddling it to her waspish editor-in-chief. Depicting the world of children’s publishing as a delicious mix of idealism and office politics, Clements squires the manuscript past slush pile and contract, the editing process, and initial buzz (“The Cheater grabs hold of your heart and never lets go,” gushes Kirkus). Finally, in a tearful, joyous scene—carefully staged by Zoe, who turns out to be perfect agent material: cunning, loyal, devious, manipulative, utterly shameless—at the publication party, Natalie’s identity is revealed as news cameras roll. Selznick’s gnomic, realistic portraits at once reflect the tale’s droll undertone and deftly capture each character’s distinct personality. Terrific for flourishing school writing projects, this is practical as well as poignant. Indeed, it “grabs hold of yourheart and never lets go.” (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: June 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-82594-3
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2001
This profoundly moving story is all the more impressive because of its basis in fact. Although the story is fictionalized, its most harrowing aspects are true: “Today, more than two hundred million children between the ages of five and seventeen are ‘economically active’ in the world.” Iqbal Masih, a real boy, was murdered at age 13. His killers have never been found, but it’s believed that a cartel of ruthless people overseeing the carpet industry, the “Carpet Mafia,” killed him. The carpet business in Pakistan is the backdrop for the story of a young Pakistani girl in indentured servitude to a factory owner, who also “owned” the bonds of 14 children, indentured by their own families for sorely needed money. Fatima’s first-person narrative grips from the beginning and inspires with every increment of pride and resistance the defiant Iqbal instills in his fellow workers. Although he was murdered for his efforts, Iqbal’s life was not in vain; the accounts here of children who were liberated through his and activist adults’ efforts will move readers for years to come. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-689-85445-5
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2003
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