Tag: animal rights

Posted in Fiction, Middle Grade, Realistic Fiction, Tween Reads

Call Me Sunflower explores alternative families

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

Call Me Sunflower, by Miriam Spitzer Franklin, (May 2017, Sky Pony Press), $15.99, ISBN: 9781510711792

Recommended for ages 9-13

Sunflower Beringer can’t stand her first name, so she has everyone call her Sunny. And she really can’t stand that her mother uprooted her and her sister, and left their dad, Scott, back in New Jersey to run his bookstore while she attends grad school in North Carolina. Now they’re living with a grandmother they barely know, and she’s the new kid in school. Ugh. Sunny has to do something, so she creates Sunny Beringer’s Totally Awesome Plan for Romance”: a can’t-miss list of ways to bring her mom and Scott back together, including making playlists of Scott’s favorite songs and getting her mother a makeover. While she works on a family album that will remind Scott and Mom of when they were in love all over again, though, she discovers a picture that changes everything. A strong subplot involving animal rights activism and Sunny’s relationship with her grandmother really gives Call Me Sunflower depth.

I’m becoming a Miriam Spitzer Franklin fangirl. I loved Extraordinary (2015); in Sunny, I found many similiaries to Pansy, Extraordinary‘s protagonist. Both stories are realistic fiction, told in the first person, about girls dealing with big life changes. They have complicated friendships and they have both There are humorous moments, and each has a unique voice, a unique point of view; Ms. Franklin captures the frustrations, the fears, and the unique experience of being a tween in a relatable voice that readers will gravitate to. I love that she created an alternative family structure with an adoptive family outside the traditional husband-wife setting and gave us a family unit that is working it all out. I admit to being a little confused with Sunny’s birth story – she is adopted, but has pictures of her mother holding her at the hospital – but that’s likely because my own adoption experience happened differently. All in all, a bittersweet, tender look at families. Pair with realistic fiction like Death by Toilet Paper by Donna Gephart, Full of Beans by Jennifer L. Holm, and Some Kind of Happiness by Claire Legrand.

 

Posted in Animal Fiction, Fiction, Middle School, Realistic Fiction, Tween Reads

When activism goes too far? Flip the Bird, by Kym Brunner

Posted on by Rosemary Kiladitis

flip-the-birdFlip the Bird, by Kym Brunner, (Noc. 2016, HMH Books for Young Readers), $17.99, ISBN: 9780544800854

Recommended for ages 11+

Issues with hunting, falconry, and animal rights activism all come together in Kym Brunner’s Flip the Bird. Fourteen year-old Mercer Buddie wants two things out of life right now: he wants a girlfriend, and he wants to be a falconer, like his father and brother. He’s training as an apprentice to his father, a master falconer, but feels like his dad favors his jock of an older brother and is too critical of him. He captures a red-tailed hawk that he names Flip – to show his dad that falconry doesn’t always have to be a Very Serious Business – and has a few short weeks to train him for the big falconry meet; he’s got his eye on the Best Apprentice Award. Then he meets Lucy, who’s gorgeous and has a great personality and seems to be just as interested in him; the only problem is that she and her family are part of a fanatical animal rights organization called HALT. Mercer tries to play both sides to stay in Lucy’s and his family’s good graces, but sooner or later, the two halves of his life are going to converge. His mother is a scientist at a university lab doing medical research, and his father has a raptor rehabilitation center in addition to being a falconer – which means, a hunter. There are a lot of difficult choices in Mercer’s immediate future.

Flip the Bird brings together a lot of hot button topics to create a moving story about family and going with the crowd. Told in the first person by Mercer, the narrative is humorous while discussing the frustrations of being the little brother; the struggle to be treated like a responsible young adult, and the difficulty in making decisions that may be unpopular with the people you want to impress the most. To impress Lucy, Mercer joins the HALT collective she forms at school, but this puts him at direct odds with his family, and they let him know it. There are consequences to his actions, and we see Mercer grow as he faces those consequences. There’s interesting information about falconry and raptor rescue here, which will appeal to fans of animal fiction and birds. While the author gives a shout-out to some of her research sources in her acknowledgements, and does emphasize the extreme commitment that falconry requires, I’d have liked to see links to information about raptor rescue at the end of the book. I did some quick searching and came up with a quick list for anyone interested: The Raptor Trust, Wild Bird Fund, and A Place Called Hope. PBS’ Falconer’s Memoir page offers a map of states permitting falconry and links to classroom activities for using “A Falconer’s Memoir” in the classroom. The World Wildlife Fund is an organization that works with wildlife conservation and endangered species, and most large zoological preserves pioneer conservation and rehabilitation practices for animals in the wild. Kym Brunner is also a seventh grade teacher, and her author website offers presentations that you can use in the classroom.

I enjoyed the book and the characters. I’ll be adding this to my shelf; if you’ve know realistic fiction, animal fiction, or middle schoolers looking for something new and different to read, add this one to your shelves and shopping lists.