Visually effective and necessarily disturbing and difficult as it sheds light on inhumanity.
Latinx youths experience the violence and trauma of politics, dehumanization, self-hatred, racism, and illness in stories set along the southern U.S. border.
This multiethnic collection featuring people from Guatemala, Mexico, the United States, and another unnamed country is enhanced by the effective use of colors combined with stark black-and-white imagery. The artwork includes some full-page panels with benday dots that appear at the end of stories, depicting a significant moment, as well as black gutters, and pages without panels that have black backgrounds. The palette creates a sense of foreboding as families head toward border separation, detention, and other tragedies. In the story of Alicia Xóchitl Arai, a Japanese Mexican teen social media influencer who moved to San Ysidro, California, six years earlier, the color scheme fittingly makes use of Instagram’s tropical sunset colors. “El Celso” follows a queer boy whose story ends in tragedy, “Alberto” spotlights a Mexico-born Border Patrol agent who projects his internalized hatred onto others, while “Rocky” shares the perspective of a “white dude who hates the world.” English and Spanish are interwoven in most of the entries. Despite the social significance of the stories’ perspectives and their context within the many manifestations of border struggles, their brevity stifles their own potential for greater emotional resonance and impact on readers.
Visually effective and necessarily disturbing and difficult as it sheds light on inhumanity. (Graphic fiction. 13-18)Pub Date: Jan. 24, 2024
ISBN: 9780814258958
Page Count: 84
Publisher: Mad Creek/Ohio State Univ. Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 23, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.
The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.
Autumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart; their mothers are still best friends. Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like[s] him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations.
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: April 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4022-7782-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A heavy read about the harsh realities of tragedy and their effects on those left behind.
In this companion novel to 2013’s If He Had Been With Me, three characters tell their sides of the story.
Finn’s narrative starts three days before his death. He explores the progress of his unrequited love for best friend Autumn up until the day he finally expresses his feelings. Finn’s story ends with his tragic death, which leaves his close friends devastated, unmoored, and uncertain how to go on. Jack’s section follows, offering a heartbreaking look at what it’s like to live with grief. Jack works to overcome the anger he feels toward Sylvie, the girlfriend Finn was breaking up with when he died, and Autumn, the girl he was preparing to build his life around (but whom Jack believed wasn’t good enough for Finn). But when Jack sees how Autumn’s grief matches his own, it changes their understanding of one another. Autumn’s chapters trace her life without Finn as readers follow her struggles with mental health and balancing love and loss. Those who have read the earlier book will better connect with and feel for these characters, particularly since they’ll have a more well-rounded impression of Finn. The pain and anger is well written, and the novel highlights the most troublesome aspects of young adulthood: overconfidence sprinkled with heavy insecurities, fear-fueled decisions, bad communication, and brash judgments. Characters are cued white.
A heavy read about the harsh realities of tragedy and their effects on those left behind. (author’s note, content warning) (Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: Feb. 6, 2024
ISBN: 9781728276229
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
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