Like every other kid lately, nine-year-old Allie Finkle is developing her list of rules for friendships, school situations, family and overall life. Dos and don’ts for any newly minted tween can get pretty complicated when an already unsettling relationship with a so-called best friend is augmented by one’s parents’ decision to sell their comfortable suburban dwelling and move to an un-renovated Victorian-style, 100-year-old gloomy and possibly haunted house in the city. And, what about the new (really old and crowded) school and a fourth grade filled with unfriendly faces? Allie is stressed but decides to take charge by hatching a scheme to prevent the sale of her suburban house and thus, the move. Cabot’s endearing, funny and clever protagonist will have readers simultaneously chuckling and commiserating as succeeding chapters introduce individual “rules” for Allie to contemplate and accept. Lessons on friendship and fickleness, sneaky behavior, lying, animal cruelty and theft (although paying for a “rescued” pet turtle that was never for sale may raise some eyebrows) merge to create a humorous and heartwarming story. Allie’s first-person voice is completely believable with just the right amount of tongue-in-cheek wit. Despite the now-overdone rules concept, readers will eagerly await Allie’s next installment in her new home, school and neighborhood. (Fiction. 8-11)
Pub Date: March 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-545-03947-5
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Though it lacks nuance, still a must-read.
Tyler is the son of generations of Vermont dairy farmers.
Mari is the Mexican-born daughter of undocumented migrant laborers whose mother has vanished in a perilous border crossing. When Tyler’s father is disabled in an accident, the only way the family can afford to keep the farm is by hiring Mari’s family. As Tyler and Mari’s friendship grows, the normal tensions of middle-school boy-girl friendships are complicated by philosophical and political truths. Tyler wonders how he can be a patriot while his family breaks the law. Mari worries about her vanished mother and lives in fear that she will be separated from her American-born sisters if la migra comes. Unashamedly didactic, Alvarez’s novel effectively complicates simple equivalencies between what’s illegal and what’s wrong. Mari’s experience is harrowing, with implied atrocities and immigration raids, but equally full of good people doing the best they can. The two children find hope despite the unhappily realistic conclusions to their troubles, in a story which sees the best in humanity alongside grim realities.
Though it lacks nuance, still a must-read. (Fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-375-85838-3
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2008
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
