A portrait of a family unit in flux for patient, thoughtful readers.
A girl navigates her family’s shifting dynamics through cartooning.
It’s nearly the end of the school year, and 10-year-old Maple has a lot to be anxious about. She’s one of only two fifth graders who has yet to ace the weekly timed math quiz—and her teacher’s promised an ice cream party once everyone’s done so. Maple and her two best friends are making summer plans, and she hopes this will be the summer when her dad fulfills his promise of helping her build a tree fort. But her mercurial dad often forgets his promises and disappears for hours, saying he needs space. Maple finds solace and relief from her parents’ arguments by sitting under her namesake backyard maple tree and drawing in her private sketchbook, where she creates comics that help her process the changes around her. This character-driven narrative is a slow-paced read that idly circles the central narrative conflict. Maple and her older brother and sister robustly demonstrate the complexity of flip-flopping emotions in response to their parents’ marital strife, including a healthy amount of sibling conflict. The supporting characters subtly demonstrate coping methods for difficult emotions. Maple’s peers’ varying maturity levels, combined with a focus on friendship and Maple’s indifference toward potential crushes, make this work well suited for younger middle-grade readers. Fawkes’ winsome illustrations provide humor and add depth; they also cue some racial diversity surrounding the white-presenting lead.
A portrait of a family unit in flux for patient, thoughtful readers. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781536231274
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.
An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.
Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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