An uninspiring musical journey.
A young violinist learns to rock out.
Flora loves to play tunes for Auntie Flora, her namesake and great-great-aunt, who lives with her family. She also enjoys playing classical music with the Arden String Quartet, where she’s first violin. When retired rock star Theo DeLuca moves to town after the tragic death of his young daughter, his son, Simon, becomes Flora’s classmate. Simon invites her to join him for the local Battle of the Bands competition, and Flora accepts after jamming out to rock music with him. But she finds that this decision creates tension within the quartet, who are also part of the competition. Further adding to her troubles is Auntie Flora’s hospitalization for pneumonia, which is making the younger Flora anxious for her life. All is neatly resolved in the end, perhaps too much so. Flora feels underdeveloped as a character, without enough description beyond her interest in music to make her feel fully dimensional. The secondary characters, including Simon and Auntie Flora, are even less nuanced, generally possessing an attribute or two but not feeling especially realistic. The narrative voice is generic, and particularly lacking is any meaningful description of playing music; at one point during the rock group’s practice, Flora aligns with the book’s tendency to tell rather than show, describing her experience as, “It’s magical. It’s exciting. It’s amazing.” The ultimate result is a tale that falls flat. Major characters present white.
An uninspiring musical journey. (author interview) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2024
ISBN: 9781772783223
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Pajama Press
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2024
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
Heartwarming fare for young pet owners who feel the love and loyalty going both ways.
Devotion permeates this tale of a small dog who’s swept up in a peasants’ revolt against a greedy king.
Inflamed with righteousness in the wake of yet another tax hike, 12-year-old Tom has defied his parents to slip away and join the revolutionary Reds. Stoutly declaring that he’s a good dog, 5-year-old Rebel chases after him to bring his beloved boy back—and discovers a wide new world beyond the farm, fraught with dangers but also rich in animal friends offering help and advice. Just as beguiling as the furry narrator’s dog’s-eye view of events are his ongoing arguments with Jaxon, a gruff feral hound he meets along the way, who urges him to find his wild inner True Dog. Jaxon’s refusal to be bound by emotional attachments ultimately clashes with Rebel’s big, uncomplicated heart. Following a brush with death, Rebel encounters a mystical Companion, who offers him glimpses of dog heaven; when the climactic battle arrives, Rebel declares, “I get to decide what I do with my one and only life. And if I use it for anything, I’m going to use it for love.” The author brings the odyssey to a satisfactory conclusion with one last, pure affirmation of love. In this story set in an alternate Britain reminiscent of its 17th-century Civil War, Rebel distinguishes humans in the cast by their voices, smell, and dress.
Heartwarming fare for young pet owners who feel the love and loyalty going both ways. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9781536246797
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: March 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2025
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