This tightly written chapter book has just the right amount of pathos for middle-grade readers.
Hurt by her overworked mother’s insistence that she’s a bad girl, 10-year-old Weezie tries her best to prove her wrong.
Fixing meals and babysitting her half siblings isn’t enough to make up for breaking Gramma Emmeline’s teapot. Weezie misses her deceased grandmother’s love and the way she called her by her full name, Grace Louise. Now she constantly gets in trouble and has to spend weekends at home alone in the trailer park while whiny Ruth Ann and Jackson get Momma’s attention. The only bright light in her life is the recognition her teacher gives her for her artistic talent, which goes unnoticed by Momma. Weezie knows who Ruth Ann’s father was, and Jackson’s daddy comes around often, but she doesn’t even know her own father’s name. She starts lying about him at school, making herself even more miserable. In desperation, she sets out on a search of her own, with surprising results. Weezie’s earnest attempts to find her father without her mother’s cooperation and her persistent efforts to be a better person are touchingly revealed through her candid narration. Strong secondary characters round out the portrayal of small-town life in Oklahoma, including Weezie’s investigative partner, her friend Calvin, who is “a little slow in his thinking” but never judges Weezie for what she does.
This tightly written chapter book has just the right amount of pathos for middle-grade readers. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 2, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4778-4729-9
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Two Lions
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
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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