Seventh-grader Callie Marin is over-the-moon to be on stage crew again this year for Eucalyptus Middle School’s production of Moon over Mississippi. Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.įrom award winner Telgemeier ( Smile, 2010), a pitch-perfect graphic novel portrayal of a middle school musical, adroitly capturing the drama both on and offstage. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish). This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. Gradually-too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic-it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. “Kira-kira” is Japanese for glittering, and Kadohata’s Katie sparkles.Ĭhainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.Įvery four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. The vivid writing and the portrayal of a most loving and honorable father lift this above the norm. Kadohata weaves details of life for a Japanese-American family into the narrative along with Lynn and Katie’s gradual acquirement of understanding of the dominant culture around them. So I didn’t need a bank, personally.” Starting out in Iowa, the family moves to Georgia both parents work long hours in the poultry industry to buy and then pay for a house of their own.

Humor keeps the depth of sadness at bay as Katie reports events: “If a robber came to our apartment, I would hit him over the head with a lamp. The supporting cast of extended family and friends also fits within Katie’s vision of life. Katie loves and admires her older sister, Lynn, only to lose her in this story that reads like a memoir about a Japanese-American family in the 1950s.īuilt around the loss of Lynn to lymphoma, it belongs to Katie and stays true to her perspective.

Kira kira kadohata