Equal parts silly and endearing, this one will appeal to fans of Wendy Mass and Megan McDonald. (Fiction. 8-12)
A fantastical and funny story features the unlikeliest of friends.
Thirteen-year-old math genius Aphrodite Wigglebottom believes that anyone can be a math whiz. She sets out to prove her theory by teaching an eighth-grade remedial math class. The students initially reject their teenage teacher, but Aphrodite slowly wins them over, both by knowing her stuff and by her willingness to use whatever means necessary to get her students’ attention, including literally gluing them into their desks. She even convinces them to compete in a math contest against the smartest kids in school. Aphrodite might know an awful lot of math, but she soon discovers that there is a lot about being 13 that she doesn’t know. Enter Mindy Loft, terrible at math but an expert at makeovers, baton twirling and, well, at being 13. The two girls narrate in alternating chapters, telling a lighthearted, funny and often bizarre saga of middle-school mayhem. Underneath the drama, though, is a gentle, uplifting message: Even though we can’t explain how or why some friendships form, the best of them help us to understand ourselves and change us in fundamental ways.
Equal parts silly and endearing, this one will appeal to fans of Wendy Mass and Megan McDonald. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Aug. 18, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-525-42333-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: July 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often...
A successful juvenile by the beloved New Yorker writer portrays a farm episode with an imaginative twist that makes a poignant, humorous story of a pig, a spider and a little girl.
Young Fern Arable pleads for the life of runt piglet Wilbur and gets her father to sell him to a neighbor, Mr. Zuckerman. Daily, Fern visits the Zuckermans to sit and muse with Wilbur and with the clever pen spider Charlotte, who befriends him when he is lonely and downcast. At the news of Wilbur's forthcoming slaughter, campaigning Charlotte, to the astonishment of people for miles around, spins words in her web. "Some Pig" comes first. Then "Terrific"—then "Radiant". The last word, when Wilbur is about to win a show prize and Charlotte is about to die from building her egg sac, is "Humble". And as the wonderful Charlotte does die, the sadness is tempered by the promise of more spiders next spring.
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often informative as amusing, and the whole tenor of appealing wit and pathos will make fine entertainment for reading aloud, too.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1952
ISBN: 978-0-06-026385-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1952
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
A real gem.
A 10-year old girl learns to adjust to a strange town, makes some fascinating friends, and fills the empty space in her heart thanks to a big old stray dog in this lyrical, moving, and enchanting book by a fresh new voice.
India Opal’s mama left when she was only three, and her father, “the preacher,” is absorbed in his own loss and in the work of his new ministry at the Open-Arms Baptist Church of Naomi [Florida]. Enter Winn-Dixie, a dog who “looked like a big piece of old brown carpet that had been left out in the rain.” But, this dog had a grin “so big that it made him sneeze.” And, as Opal says, “It’s hard not to immediately fall in love with a dog who has a good sense of humor.” Because of Winn-Dixie, Opal meets Miss Franny Block, an elderly lady whose papa built her a library of her own when she was just a little girl and she’s been the librarian ever since. Then, there’s nearly blind Gloria Dump, who hangs the empty bottle wreckage of her past from the mistake tree in her back yard. And, Otis, oh yes, Otis, whose music charms the gerbils, rabbits, snakes and lizards he’s let out of their cages in the pet store. Brush strokes of magical realism elevate this beyond a simple story of friendship to a well-crafted tale of community and fellowship, of sweetness, sorrow and hope. And, it’s funny, too.
A real gem. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: March 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0776-2
Page Count: 182
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2000
SEEN & HEARD
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