A beautifully realized book that reminds readers that there’s more than one rhythm to dance to.
In this latest offering from award winner Méndez, a crisis leads a girl to wrestle with questions of selfhood: “Without dance, I wasn’t sure who I was.”
Florencia del Lago, whose parents are from Argentina, is cast as the first-ever Latina Clara—and, at 11, the youngest one, too—in the Utah Valley Junior Ballet ensemble’s performance of The Nutcracker. With the starring role comes tremendous pressure from Madame Sophie, her strict ballet instructor. Flor’s grades suffer, she constantly questions her abilities and appearance, and her mother’s own unfulfilled ballerina dreams weigh on her. On the night of the first performance, Flor has a panic attack, which leads to public humiliation and a terrible fight between Mamá and Madame Sophie. Flor loses her spot in the studio, and her best friend, Selena, assumes the role of Clara. Flor is forced to evaluate herself, her love of dance, and the true definition of friendship. Flor’s journey is full of self-reflection, but her ample progress and insights propel the story and balance the introspective moments. That Flor is able to move past people and activities that don’t serve her, while getting therapy and trying to find new things to make her happy, will serve as inspiration to anyone who feels defined by something they used to do.
A beautifully realized book that reminds readers that there’s more than one rhythm to dance to. (author’s note, glossary) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: April 22, 2025
ISBN: 9781643796437
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Tu Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2025
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
An insubstantial story that offers a prosocial message.
Two boys equally blessed with both talent and ego vie for supremacy in their school’s annual “creative storytelling competition.”
J is “by far the best artist in the entire fifth grade”; K has “become known as the best writer in the entire fifth grade.” Naturally, each one is determined to crush it in The Contest, and each decides an illustrated story is the way to go. The competitive boys try to undermine one another by passing along fake tips for success, each hoping to destroy his opponent’s story. K advises J to “write what you DON’T know” and to use sixth-person narration. “J’s Secrets to Drawing Really Good” are just as catastrophic and include drawing with your nondominant hand and inserting mistakes to keep readers engaged. Creative hijinks ensue. Craft and Alexander have become known on social media for the jocular trash talk they heap on each other; J and K are their fictional child avatars. As an internet bit doled out in small doses, their frenemy-ship is amusing; as a sustained story about storytelling, it’s thin on both character and plot development. Authorial interjections exhort readers to look up 75-cent vocabulary, often used in barbs directed at each other; the latter feel like in-jokes more than playful attempts to engage young readers. Kids may enjoy spotting references to popular children’s authors among the characters’ names, and budding authors and illustrators will benefit from the advice. J and K are both Black; their classmates and teachers are racially diverse.
An insubstantial story that offers a prosocial message. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 6, 2025
ISBN: 9780316582681
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2025
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