A fun summer romp with honest portrayals of friendship woes and the pitfalls of well-meaning adults.
After returning to summer camp, besties Maggie and Nora start to drift apart as new friends and the supernatural come between them.
After last year’s vampire situation, Maggie eagerly anticipates the next twist Camp Sylvania might throw at them, but Nora doesn’t want anything to do with the paranormal. She can’t help but be jealous of Maggie’s friends from last year—and when Nora gets a cool bunkmate, Maggie likewise takes it as a threat to their friendship. The camp itself has undergone a New Age revamp, with the new director emphasizing the importance of chemical-free skin care products, primal-screaming workshops, a raw, vegan diet—and a glowing liquid called moon water. Then one camper goes missing, and others start to notice excessive body hair growth. Maggie and Nora will have to reconcile before their friendship and the summer go to the dogs—or is it werewolves? The girls’ differing reactions to the previous summer’s events and their strained friendship, along with the parental relationships portrayed, the new director’s genuine care for the campers, and the host of puberty references, make for a compassionate and complex presentation of tween life. Humor and clear storytelling in the narration (which alternates between the two protagonists) balance the heartfelt messaging, creating an easily digestible read. Maggie reads white; Nora is cued Latine. Final art not seen.
A fun summer romp with honest portrayals of friendship woes and the pitfalls of well-meaning adults. (map, camp invitation) (Fiction. 9-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2024
ISBN: 9780063347267
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2024
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven.
An aspiring scientist and a budding artist become friends and help each other with dream projects.
Unfolding in mid-1980s Sacramento, California, this story stars 12-year-olds Rosalind and Benjamin as first-person narrators in alternating chapters. Ro’s father, a fellow space buff, was killed by a drunk driver; the rocket they were working on together lies unfinished in her closet. As for Benji, not only has his best friend, Amir, moved away, but the comic book holding the clue for locating his dad is also missing. Along with their profound personal losses, the protagonists share a fixation with the universe’s intriguing potential: Ro decides to complete the rocket and hopes to launch mementos of her father into outer space while Benji’s conviction that aliens and UFOs are real compels his imagination and creativity as an artist. An accident in science class triggers a chain of events forcing Benji and Ro, who is new to the school, to interact and unintentionally learn each other’s secrets. They resolve to find Benji’s dad—a famous comic-book artist—and partner to finish Ro’s rocket for the science fair. Together, they overcome technical, scheduling, and geographical challenges. Readers will be drawn in by amusing and fantastical elements in the comic book theme, high emotional stakes that arouse sympathy, and well-drawn character development as the protagonists navigate life lessons around grief, patience, self-advocacy, and standing up for others. Ro is biracial (Chinese/White); Benji is White.
Charming, poignant, and thoughtfully woven. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: Jan. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-300888-5
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Quill Tree Books/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Oct. 26, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2020
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