Suspense, romance, and the excitement of discovery make this Western thoroughly enjoyable.
In the great era of dinosaur-hunting, two teenagers accompany their paleontologist fathers in a race to discover the biggest of them all: the rex.
A spirit of adventure permeates this fast-paced novel by the award-winning Oppel. Rachel Cartland is the rare 19th-century girl whose father allows her to pursue her interest in the natural sciences, at least until she marries. Samuel Bolt, with his knack for assembling fossilized bones, convinces his nearly penniless father to mount an expedition to head west and follow up on a lead from an amateur bone collector. On the train to Nebraska, they discover that the moneyed Cartlands are headed to the same place with identical intentions—and a crew of paleontology students from Yale and a U.S. Army escort. With their fathers embroiled in rivalry, Sam and Rachel are meant to spy on each other, which gives them a chance to become acquainted out of sight of others. Rich in period details and dialogue, the story shifts between Rachel’s and Sam’s alternating first-person voices. Rachel’s narrative reveals that she’s one of the few white characters with enough conscience to reflect on the savagery of the explorers’ treatment of the local Pawnee and Lakota Sioux.
Suspense, romance, and the excitement of discovery make this Western thoroughly enjoyable. (Historical fiction. 14-17)Pub Date: Oct. 11, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4814-6416-1
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
Several yards short of a touchdown.
A transgender boy starting over at a new school falls hard for a popular cheerleader with a reputation to protect in this debut.
On the first day of senior year, transgender boy Pony locks eyes with cisgender cheerleader Georgia. They both have pasts they want to leave behind. No one at Hillcrest High knows that Pony is transgender, and he intends to keep it that way. Georgia’s last boyfriend shook her trust in boys, and now she’s determined to forget him. As mutual attraction draws them together, Pony and Georgia must decide what they are willing to risk for a relationship. Pony’s best friend, Max, who is also transgender, disapproves of Pony’s choice to live stealth; this disagreement leads to serious conflict in their relationship. Meanwhile, Georgia and Pony behave as if Pony’s trans identity was a secret he was lying to her about rather than private information for him to share of his own volition. The characters only arrive at a hopeful resolution after Pony pays high physical and emotional prices. McSmith places repeated emphasis on the born-in-the-wrong-body narrative when the characters discuss trans identities. Whiteness is situated as the norm, and all main characters are white.
Several yards short of a touchdown. (Fiction. 14-17)Pub Date: May 26, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-294317-0
Page Count: 368
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
The shelves are already crowded with teens-training-for-space stories; there’s no need to make room for this one.
Teens become astronauts in record time for an inaugural space mission.
After losing his family to “the greatest flood Rome has ever known,” skilled white Italian swimmer Leo Danieli would never have expected that in his darkest moment he would be drafted by the European Space Agency to attend the International Space Training Camp, where teens will train to terraform and colonize Jupiter’s moon Europa for human settlement. California native Naomi Ardalan, a second-generation Iranian-American, has also been chosen for her expertise in science and technology. During a period of violent climate change worldwide, Earth’s governments are desperate to draft teens for a space mission for which they have only a few weeks in which to prepare. Twenty-four teen finalists, many orphaned by cataclysmic natural disasters, have been chosen from all over the world to compete for this space colonization mission. Warnings come to Leo and Naomi that there is a more sinister aspect to this mission, especially after things go tragically awry with other candidates during the training. The relationship that develops between Naomi and Leo feels forced, as if their meeting necessitates speedy deployment of a romantic cliché. The use of predictable plot devices, along with the fundamentally ludicrous premise, undermines any believability that would make a reader invest in such an elaborate space journey.
The shelves are already crowded with teens-training-for-space stories; there’s no need to make room for this one. (Science fiction. 14-17)Pub Date: March 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-265894-4
Page Count: 352
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Nov. 21, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2017
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