This book soars: Huck Finn has met his match in a wildly appealing, smart, and courageous girl.
Mary Jane, a side character from Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, takes center stage.
Celebrated scientist and bestselling adult nonfiction author Jahren has chosen as the subject of her fiction debut the girl Huck Finn describes as “just full of sand…beauty—and goodness too.” Fourteen-year-old Mary Jane is content to live with her mother and grandfather on the Minnesota frontier, shifting from a remote fur-trading outpost in winter to the comforts of Fort Snelling in summer. But when her aunt begs for help, Mary Jane’s mother sends her south via a Mississippi River steamboat, first to Fort Edwards, 400 miles away, and then, in the company of her orphaned cousins, Susan and Joanna, to their new guardian in Greenville, Mississippi. Like her eventual friend Huck Finn, Mary Jane finds adventure, true friendship, and scoundrels on the river. The peripatetic nature of her journey allows for cameo appearances by a wide variety of other characters. White Christian Mary Jane has sympathetic encounters with an Ojibwe family, persecuted members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and a Jewish peddler, among many others. She meets Sugar and Candy, an enslaved mother and daughter, and her attempts to help them carefully call out white saviorism. Jahren has done a heroic amount of research but most of all has told a cracking good story.
This book soars: Huck Finn has met his match in a wildly appealing, smart, and courageous girl. (map, family tree, author's note, suggested reading) (Historical fiction. 12-16)Pub Date: June 25, 2024
ISBN: 9780593484111
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: March 23, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Despite some missteps, this will appeal to readers who enjoy a fresh and realistic teen voice.
A teenage, not-so-lonely loner endures the wilds of high school in Austin, Texas.
Norris Kaplan, the protagonist of Philippe’s debut novel, is a hypersweaty, uber-snarky black, Haitian, French-Canadian pushing to survive life in his new school. His professor mom’s new tenure-track job transplants Norris mid–school year, and his biting wit and sarcasm are exposed through his cataloging of his new world in a field guide–style burn book. He’s greeted in his new life by an assortment of acquaintances, Liam, who is white and struggling with depression; Maddie, a self-sacrificing white cheerleader with a heart of gold; and Aarti, his Indian-American love interest who offers connection. Norris’ ego, fueled by his insecurities, often gets in the way of meaningful character development. The scenes showcasing his emotional growth are too brief and, despite foreshadowing, the climax falls flat because he still gets incredible personal access to people he’s hurt. A scene where Norris is confronted by his mother for getting drunk and belligerent with a white cop is diluted by his refusal or inability to grasp the severity of the situation and the resultant minor consequences. The humor is spot-on, as is the representation of the black diaspora; the opportunity for broader conversations about other topics is there, however, the uneven buildup of detailed, meaningful exchanges and the glibness of Norris’ voice detract.
Despite some missteps, this will appeal to readers who enjoy a fresh and realistic teen voice. (Fiction. 13-16)Pub Date: Jan. 8, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-282411-0
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
Characters to love, quips to snort at, insights to ponder: typical Spinelli.
For two teenagers, a small town’s annual cautionary ritual becomes both a life- and a death-changing experience.
On the second Wednesday in June, every eighth grader in Amber Springs, Pennsylvania, gets a black shirt, the name and picture of a teen killed the previous year through reckless behavior—and the silent treatment from everyone in town. Like many of his classmates, shy, self-conscious Robbie “Worm” Tarnauer has been looking forward to Dead Wed as a day for cutting loose rather than sober reflection…until he finds himself talking to a strange girl or, as she would have it, “spectral maiden,” only he can see or touch. Becca Finch is as surprised and confused as Worm, only remembering losing control of her car on an icy slope that past Christmas Eve. But being (or having been, anyway) a more outgoing sort, she sees their encounter as a sign that she’s got a mission. What follows, in a long conversational ramble through town and beyond, is a day at once ordinary yet rich in discovery and self-discovery—not just for Worm, but for Becca too, with a climactic twist that leaves both ready, or readier, for whatever may come next. Spinelli shines at setting a tongue-in-cheek tone for a tale with serious underpinnings, and as in Stargirl (2000), readers will be swept into the relationship that develops between this adolescent odd couple. Characters follow a White default.
Characters to love, quips to snort at, insights to ponder: typical Spinelli. (Fiction. 12-15)Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-30667-3
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 31, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2021
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