Island Creatures
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- $16.99
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
From award-winning author Margarita Engle comes a “[f]anciful, hopeful, and heartfelt” (Kirkus Reviews) love story told in verse about childhood friends, once lost and now reconnected, and their fight to protect endangered animals.
Every day, Vida reads to the creatures at the wildlife rescue center and dreams of her childhood in Cuba, where she and her best friend Adán adventured through the island rescuing animals from harm. Unbeknownst to her, Adán has also moved to Florida and is feeling trapped in his new home, buffeted by the stormy fights between his abuelo and papi. When a chance encounter with a captive fox leads to their reunion, Vida and Adán are able to find refuge from the cruelty that surrounds them in their soaring, rekindled romance.
Their love reaches new heights as they work together at the zoo that rescues rare species, but soon they realize that this peace is only temporary. Much like the wildlife they want to protect, Vida and Adán are caught in a cycle of distrust and heartlessness. As old family grudges and painful memories come to light, can they and their families learn to heal and forgive each other for a brighter, kinder future?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Engle (Wild Dreamers) melds young love, endangered wildlife, and Cuban political history in this sensitively rendered verse novel. When Cuban-born Vida and Adán were children, they bonded over their passion for rescuing animals. But after Vida's parents died from dengue fever, her investigative photojournalist grandmother Rita relocated her to Miami. Now almost 18, talented photographer Vida and baseball star Adán serendipitously meet again at a South Florida wildlife sanctuary. Their reignited childhood bond creates an emotional haven for Vida from traumatic memories of a sexual assault and for Adán from his father and grandfather's alcohol reliance and unpredictable rages. Then Adán's abuelo sees Rita's photos, an event that unearths intense emotions about the consequences of her journalism's revelations. Though the language is often mesmerizing ("each airborne kiss/ a star in the magical river/ reflected"), the lyricism may hold readers at a slight remove, and the protagonists' alternating voices are not always distinguishable. Nevertheless, Engle illuminates the unintended effects of past events on future generations in a moving love story rooted in two teens' devotion to wildlife and the dangers of climate change. References to empowering contemporary female writers appear throughout. A Spanish-language edition publishes simultaneously. Ages 12–up.
