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IN THE TUNNEL

A gripping story about family, war, mourning, and resilience told with emotion and heart.

A South Korean boy longs to rescue his father imprisoned in North Korea.

It’s 1952, and 16-year-old Myung-gi has joined the South Korean army in hopes of finding Ahpa, who was taken by North Korean soldiers two years prior. He’s trapped in a tunnel at the North-South Korean border, and as he waits for what seems like inevitable death, flashbacks transport him to the events that led to this moment. He recalls his family’s joy when Korea was liberated from Japanese imperial rule in 1945—and their despair as American and Soviet troops moved in and divided up the peninsula. His family ended up on the communist side. Myung-gi’s father smuggled in Western books for him to read and committed other quiet acts of resistance before he was taken. His mother reminds him and his younger sister of his father’s wish should he be arrested: They must undertake the dangerous journey hundreds of miles south to Busan, South Korea, and await him there. The family encounters numerous horrors along the way. Myung-gi’s PTSD—in which nothing feels real and all that is familiar is rendered strange—rings entirely true, as does his prolonged grief over losing his father. Nuanced details about the immediate aftermath of World War II in northern Korea, with fraying political alliances, growing tensions among formerly friendly neighbors, and welcome pockets of ordinary life, shed much-needed light on this time in history.

A gripping story about family, war, mourning, and resilience told with emotion and heart. (Historical fiction. 9-14)

Pub Date: May 30, 2023

ISBN: 9780823450398

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Holiday House

Review Posted Online: Feb. 24, 2023

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023

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CAPTAIN UNDERPANTS AND THE TERRIFYING RETURN OF TIPPY TINKLETROUSERS

From the Captain Underpants series , Vol. 9

Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel.

Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment.

Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. To start, in an alternate ending to the previous episode, Principal Krupp ends up in prison (“…a lot like being a student at Jerome Horwitz Elementary School, except that the prison had better funding”). There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). The villain sets off after George and Harold, who are in juvie (“not much different from our old school…except that they have library books here.”). Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. George and Harold link up in kindergarten to reduce a quartet of vicious bullies to giggling insanity with a relentless series of pranks involving shaving cream, spiders, effeminate spoof text messages and friendship bracelets. Pilkey tucks both topical jokes and bathroom humor into the cartoon art, and ups the narrative’s lexical ante with terms like “pharmaceuticals” and “theatrical flair.” Unfortunately, the bullies’ sad fates force Krupp to resign, so he’s not around to save the Earth from being destroyed later on by Talking Toilets and other invaders…

Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. (Fantasy. 10-12)

Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012

ISBN: 978-0-545-17534-0

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Scholastic

Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012

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REFUGEE

Poignant, respectful, and historically accurate while pulsating with emotional turmoil, adventure, and suspense.

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In the midst of political turmoil, how do you escape the only country that you’ve ever known and navigate a new life? Parallel stories of three different middle school–aged refugees—Josef from Nazi Germany in 1938, Isabel from 1994 Cuba, and Mahmoud from 2015 Aleppo—eventually intertwine for maximum impact.

Three countries, three time periods, three brave protagonists. Yet these three refugee odysseys have so much in common. Each traverses a landscape ruled by a dictator and must balance freedom, family, and responsibility. Each initially leaves by boat, struggles between visibility and invisibility, copes with repeated obstacles and heart-wrenching loss, and gains resilience in the process. Each third-person narrative offers an accessible look at migration under duress, in which the behavior of familiar adults changes unpredictably, strangers exploit the vulnerabilities of transients, and circumstances seem driven by random luck. Mahmoud eventually concludes that visibility is best: “See us….Hear us. Help us.” With this book, Gratz accomplishes a feat that is nothing short of brilliant, offering a skillfully wrought narrative laced with global and intergenerational reverberations that signal hope for the future. Excellent for older middle grade and above in classrooms, book groups, and/or communities looking to increase empathy for new and existing arrivals from afar.

Poignant, respectful, and historically accurate while pulsating with emotional turmoil, adventure, and suspense. (maps, author’s note) (Historical fiction. 10-14)

Pub Date: July 25, 2017

ISBN: 978-0-545-88083-1

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Scholastic

Review Posted Online: May 9, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2017

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