This is a honey of a book, and has so much that most books this year lack that people will welcome it jubilantly, yes even those to whom the lure of the wilderness, the feel for folk ways, is not ordinarily a factor in reading pleasure. It's a story that might easily have slopped over into sentimentality, but that manages to stay safely on the side of realism, a first rate boy story, with the hound-pup angle a somewhat tenuous thread that ties together a rather intricate pattern of adventure and folk tale. Two, things Cotton- aged twelve- wanted above all else,- a hound-pup and a chance to prowl the woods like "Blackie". That Blackie had no visible means of support, other than the gift for telling tall tales and for arriving at the psychological moment for a good meal, bothered Cotton not at all, and his heaven spilled over when Blackie invited him to go along on a coon-hunting trip. His Ma was a hurdle to take, but Pa managed it, and off Cotton goes, with his pal Spud, and Blackie and the mare. And they have their fill- and more- of adventure- and beauty — yes and romance too. For Blackie is lured by a girl's eyes, and they find themselves by chance at Fiddling Tom's house, where Blackie and Dony spark a bit. For Cotton the black pup that will have none of anyone is the high spot of the stopover, when the pup timorously chooses Cotton as his man — trails him ten miles when they leave- and, before the story ends, wins Cotton's mother to agreement. The book is rooted deep in folk ways. The Shivaree at the Wilsons', celebrating Dave's accident, is a superb bit of dramatization, right out of Lomax and Richard Chase, and perhaps most closely, Shaw, authority on cowboy dances. Comparison to The Yearling — to The Voice of Bugle Ann — to other boy and dog stories- is inevitable. Actually, Hound-Dog-Man is in a class by itself.
Pub Date: Jan. 19, 1948
ISBN: 0803270054
Page Count: 260
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: April 26, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1948
Troubled teen meets totemic catalyst in Mikaelsen’s (Petey, 1998, etc.) earnest tribute to Native American spirituality. Fifteen-year-old Cole is cocky, embittered, and eaten up by anger at his abusive parents. After repeated skirmishes with the law, he finally faces jail time when he viciously beats a classmate. Cole’s parole officer offers him an alternative—Circle Justice, an innovative justice program based on Native traditions. Sentenced to a year on an uninhabited Arctic island under the supervision of Edwin, a Tlingit elder, Cole provokes an attack from a titanic white “Spirit Bear” while attempting escape. Although permanently crippled by the near-death experience, he is somehow allowed yet another stint on the island. Through Edwin’s patient tutoring, Cole gradually masters his rage, but realizes that he needs to help his former victims to complete his own healing. Mikaelsen paints a realistic portrait of an unlikable young punk, and if Cole’s turnaround is dramatic, it is also convincingly painful and slow. Alas, the rest of the characters are cardboard caricatures: the brutal, drunk father, the compassionate, perceptive parole officer, and the stoic and cryptic Native mentor. Much of the plot stretches credulity, from Cole’s survival to his repeated chances at rehabilitation to his victim being permitted to share his exile. Nonetheless, teens drawn by the brutality of Cole’s adventures, and piqued by Mikaelsen’s rather muscular mysticism, might absorb valuable lessons on anger management and personal responsibility. As melodramatic and well-meaning as the teens it targets. (Fiction. YA)
Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2001
ISBN: 0-380-97744-3
Page Count: 256
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2001
Bishop’s spectacular photographs of the tiny red-eyed tree frog defeat an incidental text from Cowley (Singing Down the Rain, 1997, etc.). The frog, only two inches long, is enormous in this title; it appears along with other nocturnal residents of the rain forests of Central America, including the iguana, ant, katydid, caterpillar, and moth. In a final section, Cowley explains how small the frog is and aspects of its life cycle. The main text, however, is an afterthought to dramatic events in the photos, e.g., “But the red-eyed tree frog has been asleep all day. It wakes up hungry. What will it eat? Here is an iguana. Frogs do not eat iguanas.” Accompanying an astonishing photograph of the tree frog leaping away from a boa snake are three lines (“The snake flicks its tongue. It tastes frog in the air. Look out, frog!”) that neither advance nor complement the action. The layout employs pale and deep green pages and typeface, and large jewel-like photographs in which green and red dominate. The combination of such visually sophisticated pages and simplistic captions make this a top-heavy, unsatisfying title. (Picture book. 7-9)
Pub Date: March 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-590-87175-7
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1999
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