Flash Review: Jane, the fox & me by Fanny Britt & illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault

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By Maureen, 20 December 2021

In Fanny Britt’s tender and poignant debut graphic novel, Jane, the fox & me (ages 9+), a Quebecois schoolgirl called Hélène is silently buckling under the merciless taunting of classmates who were once her friends. Made to feel fat and unwanted, outcasted Hélène buries herself in the pages of Jane Eyre, and in reading, finds solace and comfort. But will Charlotte Brontë’s wise, slender and resilient heroine be enough to save Hélène from a four-night school camp in the forest and a chance encounter with a fox? The unadorned, poetic and honest text is complemented by Isabelle Arsenault’s gorgeously rendered illustrations of mostly moody greys and smudgy shadows. A thought-provoking and emotional, yet ultimately satisfying read that will prompt important discussions about self-confidence, body image and bullying.

NOTE: Thank you for reading my reviews! I’ll never take this website down, but in the interests of streamlining, from 1 January 2025, I’ll be posting new reviews on my writer website, www.maureentai.com, where I post lots of other bookish extras. See you there!

Flash Review: Glass Town by Isabel Greenberg

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By Maureen, 13 December 2021

Glass Town (ages 13+) is the compelling, wildly imaginative and haunting oversized graphic novel about the childhood writings of English novelist and poet, Charlotte Brontë (1816 – 1855). Based on the actual juvenilia of Charlotte and her three siblings, this work of creative historical fiction is – by her own admission – infused with liberal embellishments by Greenberg, and is as much a heartfelt homage to Brontë as it is to the colourful world and fascinating characters that Brontë created for herself when she was a child. Glass Town, while better suited for older children, is an engrossing and satisfying must-read for Brontë fans and will hopefully whet the appetite of readers unfamiliar with Brontë’s published works (such as Jane Eyre) to explore these much-loved classics.

NOTE: Thank you for reading my reviews! I’ll never take this website down, but in the interests of streamlining, from 1 January 2025, I’ll be posting new reviews on my writer website, www.maureentai.com, where I post lots of other bookish extras. See you there!

Flash Review: Snail Crossing by Corey R. Tabor

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By Maureen, 6 December 2021

In Corey Tabor’s delightful picture book, Snail Crossing (ages 4+), an energetic and cheerful snail spies a bountiful field of cabbages on the other side of a dark, grey road. Our heroic – or overly optimistic? foolhardy? naive? – gastropod immediately decides he must get to those cabbages, and sets off resolutely to cross the road. He is oblivious to the dangers , but we, the mildly-stressed readers, are not. We resist the urge to cover our eyes as we turn the pages … The surprising and satisfying conclusion proves that luck and kindness go a long way, even if our lovely snail ultimately does not.

NOTE: Thank you for reading my reviews! I’ll never take this website down, but in the interests of streamlining, from 1 January 2025, I’ll be posting new reviews on my writer website, www.maureentai.com, where I post lots of other bookish extras. See you there!

Flash Review: The Wild Book by Margarita Engle

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By Maureen, 29 November 2021

The Wild Book (ages 8+) is Cuban American poet, Margarita Engle’s, fictional verse novel inspired by her grandmother’s life in Trinidad, Cuba. Set in the early 1900s, Fefa is an eleven-year-old guajira (country girl). She’s the only child in her large family who has word-blindness, the term used then for what we know today as dyslexia. Her mother, who could have been a poetess if her circumstances had been different, gives Fefa a book of blank pages, and encourages the girl to be patient and to persevere with her reading and writing. Engle’s evocative verse pulls us hypnotically into Fefa’s colourful, lush life of too many siblings, lurking dangers and hidden fears, until we too are dreaming of riddles and towers, caimans and esperanzas (crickets), and lines made of beautiful, haunting words.

NOTE: Thank you for reading my reviews! I’ll never take this website down, but in the interests of streamlining, from 1 January 2025, I’ll be posting new reviews on my writer website, www.maureentai.com, where I post lots of other bookish extras. See you there!