An appealing story weighed down by its protagonist’s self-pity.
Judith—called Jubilee by Aunt Cora and No-Talk-Girl by the 5-year-old brother of her former friend, Sophie—narrates her own tale of personal growth during fifth grade.
The redheaded white girl’s life on an island off Maine’s coast seems idyllic; she spends her time swimming, exploring, and drawing cartoons (which, in a nice touch, appear throughout). Adoring Aunt Cora lavishes praise on her niece and allows Jubilee such indulgences as immediate adoption of a stray dog, stealing away independently to the mainland, and even deciding whether Cora should marry the lovable ferryman, Gideon. However, Jubilee is obsessed with the apparent cause of her selective mutism: feelings of abandonment when her mother left her, as a toddler, with Cora. On Jubilee’s first day in a “regular” instead of “special” class, her amazingly supportive teacher talks about “firsts.” Jubilee thinks, “If I could have a year of firsts, I’d see my mother. Sophie and I would be friends again. I’d speak!” In Jubilee, Giff demonstrates an acute understanding of how people—especially children—can be extremely observant but at the same time misunderstand the behaviors they observe. However, until nearly the end, Jubilee’s introspection borders on self-pity, which risks alienating readers who are comfortably living in alternative families. The prose is graceful and brimming with potent physical details, but the adults are alarmingly mature—except for Jubilee’s birth mother.
An appealing story weighed down by its protagonist’s self-pity. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-385-74486-7
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Wendy Lamb/Random
Review Posted Online: May 13, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs.
The Heffley family’s house undergoes a disastrous attempt at home improvement.
When Great Aunt Reba dies, she leaves some money to the family. Greg’s mom calls a family meeting to determine what to do with their share, proposing home improvements and then overruling the family’s cartoonish wish lists and instead pushing for an addition to the kitchen. Before bringing in the construction crew, the Heffleys attempt to do minor maintenance and repairs themselves—during which Greg fails at the work in various slapstick scenes. Once the professionals are brought in, the problems keep getting worse: angry neighbors, terrifying problems in walls, and—most serious—civil permitting issues that put the kibosh on what work’s been done. Left with only enough inheritance to patch and repair the exterior of the house—and with the school’s dismal standardized test scores as a final straw—Greg’s mom steers the family toward moving, opening up house-hunting and house-selling storylines (and devastating loyal Rowley, who doesn’t want to lose his best friend). While Greg’s positive about the move, he’s not completely uncaring about Rowley’s action. (And of course, Greg himself is not as unaffected as he wishes.) The gags include effectively placed callbacks to seemingly incidental events (the “stress lizard” brought in on testing day is particularly funny) and a lampoon of after-school-special–style problem books. Just when it seems that the Heffleys really will move, a new sequence of chaotic trouble and property destruction heralds a return to the status quo. Whew.
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3903-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and...
Catrina narrates the story of her mixed-race (Latino/white) family’s move from Southern California to Bahía de la Luna on the Northern California coast.
Dad has a new job, but it’s little sister Maya’s lungs that motivate the move: she has had cystic fibrosis since birth—a degenerative breathing condition. Despite her health, Maya loves adventure, even if her lungs suffer for it and even when Cat must follow to keep her safe. When Carlos, a tall, brown, and handsome teen Ghost Tour guide introduces the sisters to the Bahía ghosts—most of whom were Spanish-speaking Mexicans when alive—they fascinate Maya and she them, but the terrified Cat wants only to get herself and Maya back to safety. When the ghost adventure leads to Maya’s hospitalization, Cat blames both herself and Carlos, which makes seeing him at school difficult. As Cat awakens to the meaning of Halloween and Day of the Dead in this strange new home, she comes to understand the importance of the ghosts both to herself and to Maya. Telgemeier neatly balances enough issues that a lesser artist would split them into separate stories and delivers as much delight textually as visually. The backmatter includes snippets from Telgemeier’s sketchbook and a photo of her in Día makeup.
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and unable to put down this compelling tale. (Graphic fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-54061-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
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