An enthusiastic but uneven tale about two siblings and their adventures.
A brother and sister adjust to moving to California and living with their grandparents.
This debut middle-grade novel opens in Wichita, Kansas, where 5-year-old Donny has just wandered away from his family at the zoo. While the adults scramble to locate him, his older sister, Mary Grace, brings deductive reasoning to the problem and figures out where he has gone. With the family reunited, the siblings reflect on how happy they are to live in Wichita. But there are changes ahead because their parents have just decided to spend two years as missionaries in Africa while Donny and Mary Grace go to live with Grandma Cathy and Papa Steve in California. Rising fifth grader Mary Grace resists having to leave her home and friends, but the decision is final. In California, she slowly settles in with the help of caring teachers, sympathetic grandparents, and the Grandma Gang: Cathy and her bridge-playing friends LaShana Jackson and Elizabeth Blythe, who also have a talent for solving mysteries. When Mary Grace is harassed by an anonymous bully at school because of Donny’s Down syndrome, she manages to unmask the culprit with help from both her teacher and the Grandma Gang. Soon after the crisis is resolved, Mary Grace faces another challenge: A dognapping ring makes off with the family’s pooches, along with dozens of others. After Mary Grace and her new friend Justin’s sleuthing leads the police to the kidnappers and the neighborhood pets return home, Donny inadvertently gets in the way of a smuggling ring operating out of his great-grandmother’s retirement home. The criminals grab him while retrieving their loot. But Mary Grace—with some adult assistance—is able to save the day again and bring Donny home safely.
Pepe’s book is heartfelt and written with clear affection for Mary Grace and Donny, who are fully realized and well-rounded characters. In particular, the author does an excellent job of making Donny’s disability one part of his identity, not his defining feature, and treats his condition with sensitivity. Mary Grace’s anguish at having to leave her home just as she was getting ready to enjoy the privileges of being a nearly grown fifth grader rings true, although her parents’ decision to suddenly leave for their mission trip may leave readers questioning their judgment. The tale’s settings are also well developed, with the contrast between Kansas and California clear to readers. But the novel needed some polishing. There are numerous text errors (missing punctuation, excess capitalization, the inconsistent spelling of Down syndrome), and the dialogue sounds inauthentic at times (“Mary Grace said, ‘that’s what my friends bought for school because that’s what the stars wear on ‘YouTube’ ”). While the dognapping and smuggling plot threads strain credulity, Pepe is on firmer ground with the bullying incident, which reflects a clear understanding of how many contemporary schools handle inappropriate language and restorative justice. The grandparents’ relationship with Mary Grace and Donny is emotionally satisfying, and the presence of the Grandma Gang allows the kids to find plenty of adult support and guidance while their parents are absent.
An enthusiastic but uneven tale about two siblings and their adventures.Pub Date: Feb. 3, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-956470-26-0
Page Count: 196
Publisher: Redwood Publishing, LLC
Review Posted Online: Dec. 9, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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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