A bit long for fluff but fun nevertheless.
Brown-haired, white Lou Lou Bombay and her blue-eyed, dark-skinned Mexican-American best friend, Peacock Pearl, work to solve a series of petty crimes in their city while also participating in Latino cultural events.
The first crime of which the girls are aware is the suspicious staining of Pea’s cousin Magdalena’s quinceañera dress. Lou Lou’s prize camellia, Pinky, then falls victim to “planticide,” killed by bleach and vinegar. Lou Lou and Pea’s neighborhood, El Corazón, is full of colorful murals, and as each crime occurs, one of the murals shows something related to the crime. While getting ready to celebrate Día de los Muertos, the girls also plot ways to solve the mystery. The tone is light and the characterizations equally breezy. The third-person narrative has a strong voice, offering such quaint, explanatory sentences as, “Gardening was too dirty for her taste but she supported her best friend.” Despite the purported equality of the friendship, the text more often reveals Lou Lou’s thoughts and feelings than Pea’s. Coupled with a plethora of placed-for-optimal-understanding Spanish phrases, this gives the book a feeling—perhaps ironically—of targeting a non-Latino audience. Still, some great humor, from a nautically obsessed father to “Danielle Desserts and her snooty-girl posse,” mitigates the didacticism. The respectful relationship between the two girls offers welcome respite from tales of best-friend angst.
A bit long for fluff but fun nevertheless. (Mystery. 8-11)Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-374-30295-5
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: June 27, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
SEEN & HEARD
Certain to elicit both gales of giggles and winces of sympathy (not to mention recognition) from young readers.
First volume of a planned three, this edited version of an ongoing online serial records a middle-school everykid’s triumphs and (more often) tribulations through the course of a school year.
Largely through his own fault, mishaps seem to plague Greg at every turn, from the minor freak-outs of finding himself permanently seated in class between two pierced stoners and then being saddled with his mom for a substitute teacher, to being forced to wrestle in gym with a weird classmate who has invited him to view his “secret freckle.” Presented in a mix of legible “hand-lettered” text and lots of simple cartoon illustrations with the punch lines often in dialogue balloons, Greg’s escapades, unwavering self-interest and sardonic commentary are a hoot and a half.
Certain to elicit both gales of giggles and winces of sympathy (not to mention recognition) from young readers. (Fiction. 9-11)Pub Date: April 1, 2007
ISBN: 0-8109-9313-9
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2007
SEEN & HEARD
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
