by Aisha Saeed ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 1, 2022
A powerful tale about a preteen pushing back against systemic injustice.
A Pakistani boy learns to speak out against inequality and unfairness in this companion novel to the bestselling Amal Unbound (2018).
When readers again meet Amal’s friend Omar, the soccer-loving seventh grader is about to leave home for the first time to be a boarder at the exclusive Ghalib Academy for Boys. Though he does not know what to expect, he is eager to join the school’s astronomy club and play on a sports team. Omar also realizes that attending the school is the best chance for the child of a widowed servant to lift himself and his mother out of poverty. He is startled to discover that he and his fellow scholarship students are treated with disdain by faculty and students alike. In addition to having to do chores around campus, they are prohibited from participating in extracurricular activities and are held to much stricter academic standards than the rest of their peers. Saeed thoughtfully portrays the power dynamics and income inequality present at Ghalib while also highlighting the strong bonds Omar creates with his fellow scholarship winners. The cooperation and organization the boys demonstrate while figuring out how to advocate for themselves also serve as inspiring models for readers.
A powerful tale about a preteen pushing back against systemic injustice. (Fiction. 9-13)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-10858-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
Share your opinion of this book
More by Aisha Saeed
BOOK REVIEW
by Aisha Saeed ; illustrated by Neha Rawat
BOOK REVIEW
by Aisha Saeed
BOOK REVIEW
by Aisha Saeed ; illustrated by LeUyen Pham
More About This Book
PERSPECTIVES
by Soman Chainani ; illustrated by Iacopo Bruno ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 14, 2013
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
Share your opinion of this book
More In The Series
by Soman Chainani ; illustrated by Iacopo Bruno
by Soman Chainani ; illustrated by Iacopo Bruno
by Soman Chainani ; illustrated by Iacopo Bruno
More by Soman Chainani
BOOK REVIEW
by Soman Chainani ; illustrated by RaidesArt
BOOK REVIEW
by Soman Chainani ; illustrated by RaidesArt
BOOK REVIEW
by Soman Chainani ; illustrated by Julia Iredale
More About This Book
BOOK TO SCREEN
by Louis Sachar ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 1998
Good Guys and Bad get just deserts in the end, and Stanley gets plenty of opportunities to display pluck and valor in this...
Sentenced to a brutal juvenile detention camp for a crime he didn't commit, a wimpy teenager turns four generations of bad family luck around in this sunburnt tale of courage, obsession, and buried treasure from Sachar (Wayside School Gets a Little Stranger, 1995, etc.).
Driven mad by the murder of her black beau, a schoolteacher turns on the once-friendly, verdant town of Green Lake, Texas, becomes feared bandit Kissin' Kate Barlow, and dies, laughing, without revealing where she buried her stash. A century of rainless years later, lake and town are memories—but, with the involuntary help of gangs of juvenile offenders, the last descendant of the last residents is still digging. Enter Stanley Yelnats IV, great-grandson of one of Kissin' Kate's victims and the latest to fall to the family curse of being in the wrong place at the wrong time; under the direction of The Warden, a woman with rattlesnake venom polish on her long nails, Stanley and each of his fellow inmates dig a hole a day in the rock-hard lake bed. Weeks of punishing labor later, Stanley digs up a clue, but is canny enough to conceal the information of which hole it came from. Through flashbacks, Sachar weaves a complex net of hidden relationships and well-timed revelations as he puts his slightly larger-than-life characters under a sun so punishing that readers will be reaching for water bottles.
Good Guys and Bad get just deserts in the end, and Stanley gets plenty of opportunities to display pluck and valor in this rugged, engrossing adventure. (Fiction. 9-13)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998
ISBN: 978-0-374-33265-5
Page Count: 233
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2000
Share your opinion of this book
More by Louis Sachar
BOOK REVIEW
by Louis Sachar ; illustrated by Tim Heitz
BOOK REVIEW
by Louis Sachar
BOOK REVIEW
by Louis Sachar
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Hey there, book lover.
We’re glad you found a book that interests you!
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Don’t fret. We’ll find you.