A sweet and nostalgic family tale with an appealing protagonist.
A 12-year-old tomboy experiences an unforgettable summer in this debut middle-grade novel.
Trouble finds Ruby Mae Ryan wherever she goes. With three brothers and a naturally scrappy disposition, she lets a young bobcat run wild in the house, believing it’s a sweet little kitten—a prank initiated by Ruby’s younger brother, Marty, that results in the girl’s punishment. It’s 1940, and shenanigans abound on the Ryan family farm in rural Oregon—a place that will soon have electricity thanks to Ruby’s father’s membership in a local co-op. Meanwhile, Ruby is spending the summer working on a project of her own: catching as many crawdads as possible and selling them to local restaurants and merchants in hopes of earning enough money for a surprise known only to a select few. And there are sleepovers with her best pal, Virginia Valentine, a New Orleans transplant and the daughter of a local restaurateur who has connections to a former United States president; close encounters with her ex–best friend, Mary Belle Baxter, who became a conceited bully after moving to town; and a possible crush on Paul Johnson, the new boy in school who’s just Ruby’s age. As the summer progresses, Ruby works harder and harder to catch and sell enough crawdads and locate the legendary but elusive Crawdad Haven, where the delicious seafood is plentiful. Will she reach her goal before summer’s end and electricity’s beginning? Like Ruby, Condon caught crawdads during his childhood in rural Oregon before spending almost three decades writing and editing for a magazine about electric cooperatives. His knowledge of the book’s specific environment, a character in and of itself, shows in the vivid descriptions of Ruby’s beloved home and a very illuminating afterword that includes more information on a few of the novel’s main topics. Ruby is the star of the engaging story: a hero relatable to young and older readers alike. She’s not afraid to stick up for what matters, whether that’s making lotion to soothe her mother’s red and mottled hands or dunking a local bully at the summer fun fair.
A sweet and nostalgic family tale with an appealing protagonist. (Afterword: 243-47)Pub Date: May 3, 2022
ISBN: 979-8-9852234-1-5
Page Count: 250
Publisher: Heart of Oak Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 28, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Fiercely feisty and unapologetically goofy.
Three young girls are tasked with saving their town from a vicious worm.
This romp from actor McKinnon introduces the three Porch girls: Gertrude, age 12 and three-quarters, Eugenia, age 12 and one-eighth, and Dee-Dee, age 11. Cared for by Aunt Desdemona and Uncle Ansel (along with their seven cousins, who are all named Lavinia), they’re forced to live in a ramshackle shed at the edge of the property. In a classic turn of events, the sisters are invited to a new school run by a certain Millicent Quibb. Under Quibb’s eccentric tutelage, the trio learn that the nefarious Krenetics Research Association, hoping to release their founder, Talon Sharktūth, from his vault, has bred a Kyrgalops, a vicious stone- and puppy-chomping worm, which may destroy their entire town. McKinnon’s middle-grade debut is grandiosely silly, reminiscent of Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events in both its sesquipedalian language and tone and in relying heavily on its bespoke lexicon, verbal gymnastics, and cheeky footnotes to deliver jokes. Interspersed throughout are bits of visual interest—poems and songs, schematics, and bits of correspondence. Though the action rockets along at a Pixy Stix–fueled pace, many questions are left unanswered or unaddressed, making this series opener exposition heavy and a bit frustrating. Still, readers will ultimately be left hopeful that subsequent volumes will offer something meatier. The illustrations cue some diversity of skin tone among the characters.
Fiercely feisty and unapologetically goofy. (map, afterword, appendices) (Adventure. 8-12)Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2024
ISBN: 9780316554732
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2024
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