An uplifting, beautifully rendered story of family bonds and embracing the unknown.
A 13-year-old experiences upheaval within herself and her family.
Café Taza in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, is owned by the close-knit Calderon family and is where Maya Beatriz Montenegro Calderon spends most of her time when she’s not busy being a star soccer player. Maya and her lively Puerto Rican family do their best to keep the cafe running despite the rapid gentrification of their neighborhood. Maya’s eighth grade year brings new developments—her friendship with teammate Kayla grows, a soccer rivalry intensifies, and she has strangely vivid dreams involving water and an unknown woman that evoke feelings of déjà vu. As if she’s been summoned, the mystery woman—her estranged great-aunt Titi Yaya—suddenly appears, dredging up a decades-old feud with Maya’s abuela. Maya determinedly seeks to understand why her family became so divided and why she feels a connection to Titi Yaya and the water. Defying Abuela’s command to never speak to her great-aunt, Maya starts sneaking around, trying to learn about her Yoruba heritage and the destiny that awaits her. The energetic, bilingual dialogue is welcoming, textured, and accessible; combined with the story’s fast pace, it will keep readers engaged through an expertly written exploration of an Afro-Latine family’s history and the pantheon of West African gods. Marrero’s debut beautifully weaves together themes of family trauma, first crushes, spirituality, and history as Maya embarks on her journey of self-discovery.
An uplifting, beautifully rendered story of family bonds and embracing the unknown. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9781646142606
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Levine Querido
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2023
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs.
The Heffley family’s house undergoes a disastrous attempt at home improvement.
When Great Aunt Reba dies, she leaves some money to the family. Greg’s mom calls a family meeting to determine what to do with their share, proposing home improvements and then overruling the family’s cartoonish wish lists and instead pushing for an addition to the kitchen. Before bringing in the construction crew, the Heffleys attempt to do minor maintenance and repairs themselves—during which Greg fails at the work in various slapstick scenes. Once the professionals are brought in, the problems keep getting worse: angry neighbors, terrifying problems in walls, and—most serious—civil permitting issues that put the kibosh on what work’s been done. Left with only enough inheritance to patch and repair the exterior of the house—and with the school’s dismal standardized test scores as a final straw—Greg’s mom steers the family toward moving, opening up house-hunting and house-selling storylines (and devastating loyal Rowley, who doesn’t want to lose his best friend). While Greg’s positive about the move, he’s not completely uncaring about Rowley’s action. (And of course, Greg himself is not as unaffected as he wishes.) The gags include effectively placed callbacks to seemingly incidental events (the “stress lizard” brought in on testing day is particularly funny) and a lampoon of after-school-special–style problem books. Just when it seems that the Heffleys really will move, a new sequence of chaotic trouble and property destruction heralds a return to the status quo. Whew.
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3903-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and...
Catrina narrates the story of her mixed-race (Latino/white) family’s move from Southern California to Bahía de la Luna on the Northern California coast.
Dad has a new job, but it’s little sister Maya’s lungs that motivate the move: she has had cystic fibrosis since birth—a degenerative breathing condition. Despite her health, Maya loves adventure, even if her lungs suffer for it and even when Cat must follow to keep her safe. When Carlos, a tall, brown, and handsome teen Ghost Tour guide introduces the sisters to the Bahía ghosts—most of whom were Spanish-speaking Mexicans when alive—they fascinate Maya and she them, but the terrified Cat wants only to get herself and Maya back to safety. When the ghost adventure leads to Maya’s hospitalization, Cat blames both herself and Carlos, which makes seeing him at school difficult. As Cat awakens to the meaning of Halloween and Day of the Dead in this strange new home, she comes to understand the importance of the ghosts both to herself and to Maya. Telgemeier neatly balances enough issues that a lesser artist would split them into separate stories and delivers as much delight textually as visually. The backmatter includes snippets from Telgemeier’s sketchbook and a photo of her in Día makeup.
Telgemeier’s bold colors, superior visual storytelling, and unusual subject matter will keep readers emotionally engaged and unable to put down this compelling tale. (Graphic fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-545-54061-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
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