Brothers and Sisters – Josh's Froz-T-Freez Internet Drive-Inn

Book Review

Three siblings: Otto, Lucia, and Max; the story is told by one of them, but the teller has been sworn not to reveal him or herself by the other siblings. They live with their dad in a small town in England where they were long ago labeled the weird kids of the town, but only because their mother mysteriously vanished and/or died before they were old enough to really remember her, and the super-tall and oldest brother Otto never speaks and always wears a scarf. The nasty theory is that he strangled his own mother with the scarf in a rage of madness, and their father covered it up to protect his son.

With The Kneebone Boy, American author Ellen Potter lets loose her anglophilia and successfully hijacks the magic of the long and storied history of British children’s literature, from Lewis Carroll and C.S. Lewis to Roald Dahl and J. K. Rowling, that she clearly loves so much; except there is no magic in The Kneebone Boy. Our unidentified narrator makes this ever so clear from the outset, lest we end up disappointed.

Oddities? Does the rumored existence of a boy born with bat ears and fur all over his body and locked in the top chamber of a crumbling old castle sound normal to you?

Mysteries? If a missing mom and a furry boy locked in a castle aren’t enough mysteries for you, then you are a tougher reader than me.

Adventures? Would getting in a fight with a tattooed thug while stranded in the streets of London parentless count? How about exploring the treacherous secret passageways of the aforementioned crumbling castle, perched on a cliff overlooking the sea?

With all that, who needs magic?

Told by one of the cleverest narrative voices I’ve read in a long time and abounding with the weirdness, mystery, and plot twists of the children’s books I grew up loving, this is the first book I’ve read in a while that made me genuinely excited about children’s literature written primarily for children. For that, and even though and maybe actually partly because of the fact that this book probably won’t win any awards, it was my favorite book of 2010.

The Kneebone Boy
Written by Ellen Potter
Feiwel & Friends
288 p.
ISBN: 9780312377724
Release Date: September 14, 2010

Book Review

In the summer of 1968, when sisters Delphine, Vonetta, and Fern are put on a plane across the country from Brooklyn to Oakland, they are cautiously optimistic. They are going to California, after all, but they are going there to meet and stay with their mother, who left them before they could really remember her. Instead of the welcome hug they hope to receive from a long lost mother, they get a cranky, secretive woman who barely tolerates their being in her house, treating them neither like her children nor even like decent house guests. Instead of a vacation filled with trips to Disneyland, playing on the beach, and seeing movie stars, their California trip is four weeks stuck in a poor black Oakland neighborhood, spending their days at a youth summer camp run by revolutionary Black Panthers because their mother will not have them around all day, distracting her from her cryptic work as a poet. Will the sisters be able to get through these four weeks nearly on their own, and will they figure out the multitude of mysteries surrounding their mother, who won’t even let them set foot in her kitchen?

Delphine, at eleven years old, is one of the more mature, practical and memorable characters I’ve ever encountered in children’s literature, a strong and steady oldest daughter taking on the role of mother for her two little sisters. She deftly negotiates her sisters through numerous tense and tumultuous situations, showing great wisdom. Through Delphine’s eyes, the author shows us what it was like to be a black child in the midst of the radical late 60s. From the way she smartly calms her sisters on the plane to avoid them “making a grand negro spectacle of themselves,” to her studied assessment of the revolutionary rhetoric the girls are taught at the People’s Center as it compares to what she has learned from her father and grandmother, she shows a great understanding and gives the reader an insightful view of these times.

This would be a great book for any child who has ever been or felt abandoned by a parent. It gives no easy answers, neither unfettered condemnation nor forgiving justification for the mother’s actions, but rather shows things how they really are, without a false happy ending. It is also a great piece of historical fiction, giving readers an appreciation for the challenges and complexities of the times. Although its appeal may actually be more adult and I suspect most young readers won’t be busting down the library doors to read this one, One Crazy Summer is the best-written children’s novel I have come across this year, and therefore the strongest contender for the Newbery. (We’ll find out tomorrow.)

One Crazy Summer
Written by Rita Williams-Garcia
Amistad / HarperCollins
218 p.
Release Date: January 26, 2010