A simple, touching tale of music and family.
A 13-year-old boy reconnects with his long-lost mother in this middle-grade novel.
It’s Thanksgiving on Central New Jersey’s Sourland Mountain, and Gwilym Duckworthy has just finished the annual scavenger hunt with his diverse family when he receives a life-changing voicemail. His mother, who left Gwilym and his two older siblings in the care of their father when the teen was just 3 years old, will soon be in the area and wants to meet her youngest son for dinner. Gwilym isn’t sure what to do—he’s happy with his dad, his stepmom, and his siblings and friends and doesn’t initially tell them about his mother’s reemergence. Besides, she voluntarily packed up and abandoned them to pursue her professional music career, so why does she want to reconnect now? Gwilym ponders this as he goes through the motions of classes and his bicycle delivery job while choosing his instrument for the school band: the trumpet, which his mother also plays. As Gwilym and his mother begin to rebuild their relationship, he comes clean to his older brother Clay, who has Down syndrome, and his adopted sister, Bex, who is on the verge of getting a softball scholarship to college. The three tightknit siblings decide to watch their mother play a concert with her jazz band, processing the new relationship together. This moving novel is the second book in McGlothlin’s Sourland Mountain series, set in the backwoods of the unique area 20 minutes outside Princeton, New Jersey. The straightforward story delivers a strong cast of characters. Gwilym’s best friend, Cat Hamilton, who was featured in the series’ first book, Drawing With Whitman (2019), makes several appearances along with her family’s boarder, Benton Whitman, a quirky visual artist and descendant of Walt Whitman. Benton inspires Gwilym to see his passion for music in a whole new way. Gwilym’s world is small and intimate but distinct as well: Bex, a Black teen, was adopted as a baby, as was his cousin Hattie, who was born in China. In addition, the protagonist is sensitive and observant in ways that are realistic for a 13-year-old boy.
A simple, touching tale of music and family.Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-73635-791-0
Page Count: 146
Publisher: Bird Upstairs Books
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.
An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.
Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Entrancing and uplifting.
A small dog, the elderly woman who owns him, and a homeless girl come together to create a tale of serendipity.
Piper, almost 12, her parents, and her younger brother are at the bottom of a long slide toward homelessness. Finally in a family shelter, Piper finds that her newfound safety gives her the opportunity to reach out to someone who needs help even more. Jewel, mentally ill, lives in the park with her dog, Baby. Unwilling to leave her pet, and forbidden to enter the shelter with him, she struggles with the winter weather. Ree, also homeless and with a large dog, helps when she can, but after Jewel gets sick and is hospitalized, Baby’s taken to the animal shelter, and Ree can’t manage the complex issues alone. It’s Piper, using her best investigative skills, who figures out Jewel’s backstory. Still, she needs all the help of the shelter Firefly Girls troop that she joins to achieve her accomplishment: to raise enough money to provide Jewel and Baby with a secure, hopeful future and, maybe, with their kindness, to inspire a happier story for Ree. Told in the authentic alternating voices of loving child and loyal dog, this tale could easily slump into a syrupy melodrama, but Pyron lets her well-drawn characters earn their believable happy ending, step by challenging step, by reaching out and working together. Piper, her family, and Jewel present white; Pyron uses hair and naming convention, respectively, to cue Ree as black and Piper’s friend Gabriela as Latinx.
Entrancing and uplifting. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Aug. 13, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-283922-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Katherine Tegen/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: April 9, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2019
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