A timeless, timely, and poignant tale of derring-do.
It’s the summer of 1924 when Davy and Jo Michaud take off into a life that dreams—and nightmares—are made of.
Newly orphaned and long impoverished, narrator Davy, 12, and Jo, 17, are uncertain about what lies ahead. Their fortunes take a turn for the fantastical, however, when their mother’s estranged cousin, hotshot aviatrix Ruthie Reynard, swoops in to take the siblings under her proverbial—and literal—wing. Thrills abound as the children find a new family amid the daredevils and stalwarts of Ruthie’s circus. But behind the ever present danger of stunting lies a far more sinister threat, one from which the siblings and those they love might not escape. Set in Maine against the backdrop of the revival of the Ku Klux Klan in the Northeast, this vivid picture of senseless violence will hit home for today’s readers. As invectives fuel anti-immigrant sentiment, Davy realizes that he and his sister, whose father was an immigrant from Quebec, are the “foreign invaders” the Klan hates. The circus plot thread, full of heart and warmth, clashes with these themes in a way that keeps readers firmly invested in the fates of tenderly crafted characters they will grow to love. The first-person narration reads somewhat awkwardly, though it’s befitting of a young not-quite-man still growing into himself and his place in the world. Characters default to White.
A timeless, timely, and poignant tale of derring-do. (information you may find interesting, photograph, additional reading) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 6, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-338-73629-8
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2022
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
Plays to Rowling’s fan base; equally suited for gifting and reading aloud or alone.
A 7-year-old descends into the Land of the Lost in search of his beloved comfort object.
Jack has loved Dur Pig long enough to wear the beanbag toy into tattered shapelessness—which is why, when his angry older stepsister chucks it out the car window on Christmas Eve, he not only throws a titanic tantrum and viciously rejects the titular replacement pig, but resolves to sneak out to find DP. To his amazement, the Christmas Pig offers to guide him to the place where all lost Things go. Whiffs of childhood classics, assembled with admirable professionalism into a jolly adventure story that plays all the right chords, hang about this tale of loss and love. Along with family drama, Rowling stirs in fantasy, allegory, and generous measures of social and political commentary. Pursued by the Land’s cruel and monstrous Loser, Jack and the Christmas Pig pass through territories from the Wastes of the Unlamented, where booger-throwing Bad Habits roam, to the luxurious City of the Missed for encounters with Hope, Happiness, and Power (a choleric king who rejects a vote that doesn’t go his way). A joyful reunion on the Island of the Beloved turns poignant, but Christmas Eve being “a night for miracles and lost causes,” perhaps there’s still a chance (with a little help from Santa) for everything to come right? In both the narrative and Field’s accomplished, soft-focus illustrations, the cast presents White.
Plays to Rowling’s fan base; equally suited for gifting and reading aloud or alone. (Fantasy. 8-12)Pub Date: Oct. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-338-79023-8
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Oct. 20, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2021
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