Mister Boots (review)
2005; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 59; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/bcc.2005.0259
ISSN1558-6766
Autores Tópico(s)Themes in Literature Analysis
ResumoReviewed by: Mister Boots Krista Hutley Emshwiller, Carol Mister Boots. Viking, 2005 [192p] ISBN 0-670-05968-4$15.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad Gr. 6-9 When ten-year-old Bobby (Roberta) Lassiter finds an injured man out in the California desert, not far from home, she keeps him a secret from her mother and older sister. The stranger claims that he really a transformed horse named Boots, and Bobby believes him. After all, everyone pretends she is a boy, especially when her abusive father is around—he's never been told she's actually a girl. When Bobby's mother dies and Bobby's father returns to bring his only "son" into the family business of stage magic, Boots goes along with them to Los Angeles, in part to protect Bobby and her sister. Though they are a hit at the circus, where pretending to be something you're not is all part of the act, some secrets, like some horses, have a way of running wild, and Bobby knows that she can't hold the reins for long. This unusual book has a hazy quality to its storytelling, capturing the feeling of waking from an odd dream and still, for a few seconds, believing that it really happened. While Boots' transformations are the only real magic in the story, Bobby, who narrates in the first person, has a plainspoken style infused with a sense of wonder that marks her as a little disconnected from reality in general. While the effect is interesting, the story and characters are difficult to grab on to, and some readers will lose patience with the evanescence. Still, both Mister Boots' and Bobby's transformations—horse and human, boy and girl—effectively highlight the results of leading a dual existence in a world where you can't stay in between forever, and this may appeal to readers who wish they could. Copyright © 2005 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
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