In New Zealand in 1943, wounded American GIs were invited to local homes to convalesce. Drawing on his own boyhood, Gee depicts the dramatic, ultimately tragic, events surrounding the visit of one such soldier: Private Jackson Coop. ``Jack'' is nothing like the enemy-destroying hero that 12-year-old Rex Pascoe has conjured up after reading simplistic pulp fiction: he's courteous, quiet, kind—and black, which elicits enmity from several locals (though their own policeman is a Maori) and especially from two other GIs, Ozark rednecks. In a skillfully plotted sequence involving two more children (half-Maori Dawn and Croatian Leo, both also butts of prejudice), Rex comes to admire and finally to love Jack; in the end, after Jack goes AWOL rather than fight the rednecks, Rex and the others try to help him escape. Jack himself comprises too many clichÇs to be a fully realized character (he's musically and physically gifted, with street smarts learned in a Chicago slum), but he's an admirable one, well suited to contrast with Rex's superhero ideal—as well as with his flawed father Alf (``gabby tricky Dad, my crooked dad'') and his shady deals. A lively, idiosyncratic cast keeps the story moving; and while it's less intensely suspenseful than Gee's The Fire-Raiser (1992), it's another likable, thoughtful examination of wartime pressures and prejudices in a small, vividly portrayed New Zealand community. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1993
ISBN: 0-671-86561-7
Page Count: 214
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1993
A world-class charmer, Clements (The Janitor’s Boy, 2000, etc.) woos aspiring young authors—as well as grown up publishers, editors, agents, parents, teachers, and even reviewers—with this tongue-in-cheek tale of a 12-year-old novelist’s triumphant debut. Sparked by a chance comment of her mother’s, a harried assistant editor for a (surely fictional) children’s imprint, Natalie draws on deep reserves of feeling and writing talent to create a moving story about a troubled schoolgirl and her father. First, it moves her pushy friend Zoe, who decides that it has to be published; then it moves a timorous, second-year English teacher into helping Zoe set up a virtual literary agency; then, submitted pseudonymously, it moves Natalie’s unsuspecting mother into peddling it to her waspish editor-in-chief. Depicting the world of children’s publishing as a delicious mix of idealism and office politics, Clements squires the manuscript past slush pile and contract, the editing process, and initial buzz (“The Cheater grabs hold of your heart and never lets go,” gushes Kirkus). Finally, in a tearful, joyous scene—carefully staged by Zoe, who turns out to be perfect agent material: cunning, loyal, devious, manipulative, utterly shameless—at the publication party, Natalie’s identity is revealed as news cameras roll. Selznick’s gnomic, realistic portraits at once reflect the tale’s droll undertone and deftly capture each character’s distinct personality. Terrific for flourishing school writing projects, this is practical as well as poignant. Indeed, it “grabs hold of yourheart and never lets go.” (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: June 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-82594-3
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2001
This profoundly moving story is all the more impressive because of its basis in fact. Although the story is fictionalized, its most harrowing aspects are true: “Today, more than two hundred million children between the ages of five and seventeen are ‘economically active’ in the world.” Iqbal Masih, a real boy, was murdered at age 13. His killers have never been found, but it’s believed that a cartel of ruthless people overseeing the carpet industry, the “Carpet Mafia,” killed him. The carpet business in Pakistan is the backdrop for the story of a young Pakistani girl in indentured servitude to a factory owner, who also “owned” the bonds of 14 children, indentured by their own families for sorely needed money. Fatima’s first-person narrative grips from the beginning and inspires with every increment of pride and resistance the defiant Iqbal instills in his fellow workers. Although he was murdered for his efforts, Iqbal’s life was not in vain; the accounts here of children who were liberated through his and activist adults’ efforts will move readers for years to come. (Fiction. 10-14)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-689-85445-5
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2003
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