Aimed toward a sensitive adolescent male audience, this story has a straightforward, interesting plot and simple, clear...
The second book in the middle-grade Animal Rescues series explores a boy’s adolescent insecurities and his uncomfortable relationship with his father.
Fourteen-year-old Austin, overweight and nicknamed Pudge, is an animal lover, good student, and enthusiastic “World of Warcraft” gamer. His mother left when he was young, and his father, a biologist for the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito, thinks “video games are a waste of energy.” When Austin is caught gaming during school hours and suspended for two days, his father takes him to work, where they row out into the bay to survey whales. There, they encounter a humpback whale badly entangled in a fishing net, and Austin finds the real-life courage to swim next to the whale and cut her free, earning his father’s respect. An odd scene occurs when Austin, too out-of-shape to heave himself back into the boat, simply allows himself to begin to drift away while carrying on an imaginary conversation with a gamer-girl he met previously online—it’s unclear whether Halls intends this passive acceptance of possible death as a commentary on role-playing games. Despite this moment of confusion, though, readers will empathize with Austin’s first-person, present-tense narration as he sorts through the challenges of finding his own strengths and convictions.
Aimed toward a sensitive adolescent male audience, this story has a straightforward, interesting plot and simple, clear language. (Adventure. 9-14)Pub Date: April 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4677-7220-4
Page Count: 88
Publisher: Darby Creek
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2016
Fast-paced and plot-driven.
In his latest, prolific author Gratz takes on Hitler’s Olympic Games.
When 13-year-old American gymnast Evie Harris arrives in Berlin to compete in the 1936 Olympic Games, she has one goal: stardom. If she can bring home a gold medal like her friend, the famous equestrian-turned-Hollywood-star Mary Brooks, she might be able to lift her family out of their Dust Bowl poverty. But someone slips a strange note under Evie’s door, and soon she’s dodging Heinz Fischer, the Hitler Youth member assigned to host her, and meeting strangers who want to make use of her gymnastic skills—to rob a bank. As the games progress, Evie begins to see the moral issues behind their sparkling facade—the antisemitism and racism inherent in Nazi ideology and the way Hitler is using the competition to support and promote these beliefs. And she also agrees to rob the bank. Gratz goes big on the Mission Impossible–style heist, which takes center stage over the actual competitions, other than Jesse Owens’ famous long jump. A lengthy and detailed author’s note provides valuable historical context, including places where Gratz adapted the facts for storytelling purposes (although there’s no mention of the fact that before 1952, Olympic equestrian sports were limited to male military officers). With an emphasis on the plot, many of the characters feel defined primarily by how they’re suffering under the Nazis, such as the fictional diver Ursula Diop, who was involuntarily sterilized for being biracial.
Fast-paced and plot-driven. (Historical fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781338736106
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2025
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious.
If you made a recording to be heard by the aliens who found the iPod, what would you record?
For 11-year-old Alex Petroski, it's easy. He records everything. He records the story of how he travels to New Mexico to a rocket festival with his dog, Carl Sagan, and his rocket. He records finding out that a man with the same name and birthday as his dead father has an address in Las Vegas. He records eating at Johnny Rockets for the first time with his new friends, who are giving him a ride to find his dead father (who might not be dead!), and losing Carl Sagan in the wilds of Las Vegas, and discovering he has a half sister. He even records his own awful accident. Cheng delivers a sweet, soulful debut novel with a brilliant, refreshing structure. His characters manage to come alive through the “transcript” of Alex’s iPod recording, an odd medium that sounds like it would be confusing but really works. Taking inspiration from the Voyager Golden Record released to space in 1977, Alex, who explains he has “light brown skin,” records all the important moments of a journey that takes him from a family of two to a family of plenty.
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-18637-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2016
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