Book Reviews

Is Your Buffalo Ready for Kindergarten?

| Tasha

Is Your Buffalo Ready for Kindergarten by Audrey Vernick, illustrated by Daniel Jennewein

If your buffalo has a backpack, then he is certainly ready for Kindergarten!  This book takes a silly look at first-day Kindergarten jitters through the eyes of a student who is sure to be unique.  Buffalos may have trouble with certain rules, like No Grazing at recess, but your buffalo will also be great at hide-and-seek and serve as a comfy place to snuggle in to listen to stories.  He will also learn about sharing with others and not losing his temper and butting them with his head.  There’s a lot to learn in Kindergarten, especially if you are a buffalo!

This is a hilarious look at Kindergarten that is sure to have children giggling.  Ideal to share with Kindergarteners on that first day, or with your preschooler who is headed to Kindergarten.  Vernick has written the book with an eye towards laughter, but also shows the daily routines of Kindergarten and the various issues that can arise.  It is a very balanced look at Kindergarten done with a lot of humor.  Jennewein’s illustrations are comic and wonderful.  He captures the pure silliness of the huge buffalo at school using simple lines and nice strong colors.  The illustrations will work well with a group.

Highly recommended for all Kindergarteners and their parents, this is a great book to read in August to get your buffalo ready for school.  Appropriate for ages 4-6.

Reviewed from library copy.

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Big Night for Salamanders

| Tasha

Big Night for Salamanders by Sarah Marwil Lamstein, illustrated by Carol Benioff

On a rainy spring day, a young boy comes home hoping that this will be the Big Night.  After dinner, the boy gets his raincoat on and a flashlight covered in pink plastic to lessen the glare.  He and his parents head out to the wet road in the dark.  In the dark and the rain, the family help salamanders cross the road safely as they move from forest to pond to lay their eggs.  But some of the cars are going so fast that it is dangerous not only for the salamanders.  So the boy creates a sign that says “Go Slow, Salamander Crossing!”  It is indeed a Big Night.

The story of the boy is presented side-by-side with information on what the salamanders are doing.  Readers get insight into the animals, told in a much more poetic and flowing way than the human story.  It makes for a lovely contrast with one another where not just the font and the content tell the different stories but also the tone and writing style.

Benioff’s illustrations are equally at home with the humans and the salamanders.  It is a pleasure seeing a child of color in a story where there is no mention of it at all.  Her art is bold enough to work with groups, and this book as a whole is ideal for reading aloud in storytimes about spring or salamanders.  All children will reach the end of the book wishing that they too could shepherd salamanders across a road at night.

A lovely science story book, this book successfully marries science into a picture book story.  Appropriate for ages 4-6.

Reviewed from library copy.

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Crossing the Tracks

| Tasha

midwest train tracks

Crossing the Tracks by Barbara Stuber

After Iris’ mother died, her father no longer has time for her, immersed in his growing shoe business.  When the business is about to expand to Kansas City, her father hires her out to a farm family without informing her first much less asking her opinion.  So Iris is sent to care for an elderly woman and her doctor son in rural Missouri.  She leaves behind her best friend Leroy and any illusions about her father caring about her.  The move to the country turns out to be the best thing that could have happened to Iris.  The family is warm and friendly to Iris, who slowly learns a lot about herself, her courage, and her connection to her mother.  But all is not perfect in the countryside, they live far too close to an angry man who drove off his wife and is now doing unspeakable things to his daughter.  Iris has to find a cunning way to help a girl who has only ever hated her.  In the end, Iris may be a hobo, but so are we all.

A virtuoso of a debut performance, this book is written with strength and conviction.  Stuber’s writing is beautifully constructed, each small detail meant to lead somewhere in the story or mean something more to the reader.  She uses several important themes that tie the entire novel together: homelessness and hobos being the most significant.  Yet she never allows these themes to drive the story, rather they are part of it, a twining of theme around the plot.  It is beautifully done.

Set in the 1920s, the book never gets bogged down with period details, rather the time period is portrayed through the story.  It is woven in and helps tell the story itself.  Doctors make housecalls, cars are fairly new machines, and there are no cell phones and only party lines. 

Iris is a marvelous protagonist with her hard exterior from years with her father neglecting her and yet her yearning for connection and family.  Iris grows as the story progresses and kindness is shown her.  Stuber has written her growth in a natural and organic way that really rings true.  There are no unbelievable leaps forward, but a slow movement with steps backwards.  The supporting cast is also very well rendered right down to Marie, the dog.  Mrs. Nesbitt, the fiesty woman whom Iris cares for, does just as much caring for Iris.  Mrs. Nesbitt is one of the reasons this book is so successful, she is hardly the stereotypical elderly woman, far from it. 

Highly recommended, this book is historical fiction with a touch of romance and danger.  It is an intoxicating mix that readers will find difficult to put down.  I happily await her next novel!  Appropriate for ages 12-15.

Reviewed from copy received from Simon & Schuster.

Check out Barbara’s website here and the trailer for the book below:

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Zen & Xander Undone

| Tasha

Zen & Xander Undone by Amy Kathleen Ryan

Zen and Xander are sisters who lost their mother a year ago.  In his grief, their father removed himself from their lives, living in the basement and rarely talking to them.  Each sister coped with the loss differently.  Zen, narrator of the book, immersed herself even more in martial arts.  Xander started more and more risky behaviors, coming home drunk or high with questionable guys.  Zen found great pleasure in kicking one of those guys in the head, though it injured her back.  It certainly did feel good though.  As the two girls drift further apart, a mystery brings them back together.  They discover that their mother left a valuable statue to a man they have never heard of.  Now the two of them have to decide whether to solve the mystery or return to their grief apart.

A beautiful depiction of sisters who are best friends but very different from one another, this book also explores grief with an openness that is breathtaking.  I particularly appreciated the intelligence of both of the sisters, both of them bright and filled with humor, caustic at times.  Their complex relationship was depicted in a realistic way, never straying too far from the core of sisterhood that held them together. 

Xander is a particularly complex character, drowning her grief in booze and drugs and throwing in a lot of risk at the same time.  She is difficult to like, until you realize that you are seeing her only in small glimpses.  Otherwise her behavior is shielding her from the reader.  In the end, she is what makes the book gritty and realistic.  She is the barbed truth of grief and coping.

Ryan’s writing is impeccable with a great ear for dialogue, a modern style without relying on any branding to keep it current, and a genuine appreciation for teens.  She manages not to be didactic about grief at all, allowing both girls to find their own way not as examples for others but as individuals.  Both sisters move through the loss of their mother in well rendered ways, even their mistakes making great sense. 

A humor-filled book with great depth, this reads like John Green with girls thanks to the smart sisters.  Appropriate for ages 15-18.

Reviewed from library copy.

Also reviewed by:

Bamboo People

| Tasha

Bamboo People by Mitali Perkins

Set in modern Burma, this novel is the story of two teen boys on opposite sides of the conflict between the Burmese and the Karenni, one of Burma’s ethnic minorities.  Chiko’s father has been arrested for opposing the Burmese government.  Now Chiko and his mother have no money to survive on, so Chiko heads out to be tested for a teaching position.  But the test was a trap, and Chiko is taken into the Burmese army training to become a soldier.  There he uses his wits to survive, befriending a street boy, who knows much more about fighting and survival than he does.  When the time comes to allow his friend to head to the jungle on a dangerous mission, Chiko steps up and offers himself instead.  Through that mission, he is rescued by Tu Reh, a Karenni teen, who has hated the Burmese ever since they burned down his village.  Now Chiko’s life is in the hands of Tu Reh, who sees him only as the enemy.  This book is about the bravery it takes to make decisions that turn boys into men, learning that compassion is the only way forward.

Beautifully written, Perkins has captured a complicated situation in a way that young readers will not only understand but will be drawn to.  Rather than using alternating chapters for the two points of view, Perkins tells the first part of the book from Chiko’s point of view and then Tu Reh enters in the second half.  This lends a great cohesiveness to the story, allowing readers to view the conflict from both sides, understand both, and at the same time get enough in-depth time with each character to see through their eyes. 

Perkins excels at depicting foreign cultures through sounds, scents, and tastes.  Food is used to convey the differences and similarities of cultures.  There are no long paragraphs of description here, instead readers are treated to details woven into the story that bring the entire book to life.  This is done with a skill that makes it seem effortless. 

Her characterizations are also done with the same grace, allowing readers to slowly learn about the two boys, learn about the cultures, and slowly be exposed to the horror that teens on both sides of the conflict live with.  The darker parts of battle and imprisonment are dealt with obliquely, allowing readers to bring their own level of understanding to the atrocities being committed.  Again, this is a testimony to the skill of Perkins’ writing.

Highly recommended, this book takes the horrors of war and package them in a piercingly beautiful story.  Appropriate for ages 12-15.

Reviewed from copy received from Charlesbridge.

Also reviewed by many, many other bloggers.  Check out a list of them on Mitali’s blog.

Sharing the Seasons

| Tasha

Sharing the Seasons selected by Lee Bennett Hopkins, illustrated by David Diaz

I consider Lee Bennett Hopkins one of the greatest anthologists of children’s poetry in our time.  His latest collection offers poetry that celebrates the seasons.  Once again his skill at placement of poems next to one another is apparent.  He manages to form an order to the poems that reads fluidly and never groups them together lumpily by smaller themes.  This collection features poems that are child friendly, but never didactic.  They are poems that sing and thanks to the conducting skills of Hopkins, they are a symphony.

Hopkins contributed poems himself to the anthology, often using them to frame the theme.  There are poems here that are quite short but stunningly deep.  The one I adore most ends the anthology:

December by Sanderson Vanderbilt

A little boy stood on the corner

And shoveled bits of dirty, soggy snow

Into the sewer–

With a jagged piece of tin.

He was helping spring to come.

Diaz’s art is glowing.  Rich and warm, it encircles the poems and illuminates them.  He captures the light and holds it to the page in vibrant color.  Beautiful and poetic.

Highly recommended, this poetry anthology is a jewel.  Perfection for seasonal poems, it sings of the seasons.  Appropriate for ages 4-9.

Reviewed from copy received from McElderry Books.

Also reviewed by A Patchwork of Books.

Lunch Lady and the Summer Camp Shakedown

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Lunch Lady and the Summer Camp Shakedown by Jarrett J. Krosoczka

A fourth book in the spectacularly funny Lunch Lady series, this book returns with the same formula of humor and action.  In this book, Lunch Lady is working at a summer camp that the Breakfast Bunch kids just happen to be attending.  This is not going to be the relaxing summer they all expected!  A swamp monster is on the loose at camp, coming out only at night.  Now Lunch Lady and the kids have to once again join forces to find out who is behind the attacks.

The puns here are just as funny as in all of the previous books.  They are guaranteed to have readers groaning and then sharing them aloud with friends.  The art is just as simple and fun too, sticking to the limited color palette that marks this clearly as a Lunch Lady book. 

A winning addition to a very popular series, every library should have this series for young graphic novel fans.  Appropriate for ages 7-10.

Reviewed from copy received from Knopf.

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The Buffalo Are Back

| Tasha

 

The Buffalo Are Back by Jean Craighead George, paintings by Wendell Minor

This is the haunting story of the loss of the buffalo herds that once thundered across the United States.  It is a story of the buffalo, the prairies and the Native Americans.  The Indians knew how to care for the grasslands and by caring for the grass, they took care of the buffalo which they depended on for survival.  So when the Indians stood against the American government and its settlers, defending the land, the government ordered the buffalos killed off.  Now the settlers battled the grass, tearing it up to create farmland.  Farmland that was doomed to become the Dust Bowl when the very soil crumbled to dust and locusts attacked their crops.  But the buffalo were not exterminated.  With Teddy Roosevelt came change and a love of the buffalo. Now there is a return of the buffalo and the grasses.

George captures a tumultuous and horrible history in this book for children.  She manages to take an overwhelming loss and condense it into something that is understandable for young children.  Her words are powerful, evocative and beautiful.  She captures the fragility of nature and earth with spirit and honesty.  The paintings by Minor take this book to another level.  His depictions of the glorious buffalo, the endlessness of the prairie, and the horrors of destruction are breathtaking.  His virtuoso art brings the entire history to life.

In the end, this book is about hope.  It is about the fact that we have choices to make, and that we can make a difference.  Beautiful and stunning, we must be part of creating the future this book tells us of.  Appropriate for ages 7-10.

Reviewed from copy received from Dutton.

Blindsided

| Tasha

Blindsided by Priscilla Cummings

Natalie has been losing her sight since she was eight.  She is still able to see in a tunneled form, but then receives the news that she will lose her sight completely in a short period of time.  Natalie is sent to a school for the blind to learn the skills she will need to have when she is blind.  She is taught Braille and how to walk with a cane. But she doesn’t consider herself in the same situation as the other teens at the school.  They are blind and she is not.  She does learn the skills, but inwardly refuses to accept the situation, hoping for a miracle to happen.  Eventually her sight does leave completely and now Natalie has to choose between using the skills she learned and becoming independent or remaining scared and protected at home.

This book is a mix of positive and negative for me.  Natalie was a fine character with intelligence, lots of doubts, and complex reactions to her situation.  She was well drawn and interesting.  The information on the school for the blind and her skills were also interesting, though they could have been woven more into the story itself so that they read more effortlessly. 

Unfortunately, the book suffered from heavy-handed writing that was often didactic in tone.  There was a sense that the author had a lot to say about overcoming obstacles and disabilities.  Her need to inform others intruded on the story itself, which would have been much stronger without the tone.  Additionally, there were often moments when Natalie grew to new understanding which the author underlined and pointed out, lessening their impact instead of strengthening it as intended.

I must also quibble with the foreshadowing of the action-filled ending, which would have been surprising except that it was built into the story too clearly with events leading directly to it.  Again, a more even-handed writing style would have raised it to another level.

Appropriate for ages 13-16.

Reviewed from copy received from Dutton.