Like Michael Collins, whom Ruby settles on for her big school project, she is a quiet hero.
Ruby, Dahlia, Abigail, and Ahmad are all challenged to do the right thing in this debut novel.
After the sudden death of her father, Ruby and her mother, Dahlia, change cities several times before settling in Fortin, Vermont. On the first day of work, Dahlia stands up for herself against her bully employer and files a claim against him with the police. However, instead of justice, she finds herself arrested and potentially facing a year in prison. Stuck in Fortin, Ruby adopts the strategy of invisibility at school and works hard to avoid its traditional, much-anticipated wax-museum event, in which each sixth-grader researches and embodies a historic character for the whole town to see. She also makes two friends: Abigail, a reclusive neighbor who takes care of wild birds, lives in isolation, and is rumored in the small town to have worked with astronauts, and Ahmad, a Syrian kid who moved to the U.S. two years ago. The stories of the main characters intertwine beautifully, each one demonstrating the self-trust that enables them to do the right thing and to forgive. Writing in Ruby’s voice, Ferruolo creates an engaging plot peopled with complex characters that gracefully navigate many issues of our time, including women’s rights, immigration, prejudice and diversity, and bullying. Ruby, her family, and Abigail are default white.
Like Michael Collins, whom Ruby settles on for her big school project, she is a quiet hero. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-374-30905-3
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Nov. 25, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An endearing protagonist runs the first, fast leg of Reynolds' promising relay.
Castle “Ghost” Cranshaw feels like he’s been running ever since his dad pulled that gun on him and his mom—and used it.
His dad’s been in jail three years now, but Ghost still feels the trauma, which is probably at the root of the many “altercations” he gets into at middle school. When he inserts himself into a practice for a local elite track team, the Defenders, he’s fast enough that the hard-as-nails coach decides to put him on the team. Ghost is surprised to find himself caring enough about being on the team that he curbs his behavior to avoid “altercations.” But Ma doesn’t have money to spare on things like fancy running shoes, so Ghost shoplifts a pair that make his feet feel impossibly light—and his conscience correspondingly heavy. Ghost’s narration is candid and colloquial, reminiscent of such original voices as Bud Caldwell and Joey Pigza; his level of self-understanding is both believably childlike and disarming in its perception. He is self-focused enough that secondary characters initially feel one-dimensional, Coach in particular, but as he gets to know them better, so do readers, in a way that unfolds naturally and pleasingly. His three fellow “newbies” on the Defenders await their turns to star in subsequent series outings. Characters are black by default; those few white people in Ghost’s world are described as such.
An endearing protagonist runs the first, fast leg of Reynolds' promising relay. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4814-5015-7
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Caitlyn Dlouhy/Atheneum
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
SEEN & HEARD
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious.
If you made a recording to be heard by the aliens who found the iPod, what would you record?
For 11-year-old Alex Petroski, it's easy. He records everything. He records the story of how he travels to New Mexico to a rocket festival with his dog, Carl Sagan, and his rocket. He records finding out that a man with the same name and birthday as his dead father has an address in Las Vegas. He records eating at Johnny Rockets for the first time with his new friends, who are giving him a ride to find his dead father (who might not be dead!), and losing Carl Sagan in the wilds of Las Vegas, and discovering he has a half sister. He even records his own awful accident. Cheng delivers a sweet, soulful debut novel with a brilliant, refreshing structure. His characters manage to come alive through the “transcript” of Alex’s iPod recording, an odd medium that sounds like it would be confusing but really works. Taking inspiration from the Voyager Golden Record released to space in 1977, Alex, who explains he has “light brown skin,” records all the important moments of a journey that takes him from a family of two to a family of plenty.
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-18637-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
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