Chameleon

December 1, 2008
Gr 6-8-It's a typical summer for 14-year-old Shawn. He's hanging out with his friends and avoiding confrontations with the roving gangs of Crips and Pirus, who think they own the streets of Compton, where his aunt lives and where he goes to school. But as he gets older and life on the L.A. streets starts to get more dangerous, Shawn begins to think that he'd fare better in the suburb where his parents live, even though he'd be a latchkey kid. And after a particularly vicious fight with a group of older gang members and some embarrassing scenes with drunken Aunt Gertie, Shawn's parents agree that he should attend his local high school in the fall. Is Shawn willing to trade his friendships with his loyal boys, not to mention a budding relationship with Marisol, in exchange for calm and stability in a new school where he knows no one? This episodic tale moves at the pace of the longest, hottest days of summerslow, slow, slow. Despite the gritty and realistically drawn inner-city setting, most readers won't be able to maintain their interest through endless descriptions of minor incidents that never seem to build to anything substantive. Even the story's climactic fight fails to spark any real movement in the plot. Smith does a commendable job evoking the sights and sounds of street life, but without strong plotting, this meandering novel doesn't satisfy."Meredith Robbins, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis High School, New York City"

Copyright 2008 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 15, 2008
The summer before high school, Shawn, 14, hangs out with his boys in their Los Angeles inner-city neighborhood, playing ball, exchanging hilarious insults (Ya mama . . .), watching kung-fu flicks, and trying to stay out of the turf of the violent rival street gangs. He dreams about his beautiful Mexican classmate, Marisol, who seems to like him. His divorced parents still get along, and he spends fun time with his dad, shooting hoops and talking frankly (even about wet dreams). Both parents encourage him to read, especially books by black writers, and he is really into The Autobiography of Malcolm X. Smith, whose biography Twelve Rounds to Glory: The Story of Muhammad Ali (2007) was a Coretta Scott King Author Honor Book, is sometimes heavy with his messages in his first YA novel, but he offers no slick resolution. Kids will grab this for the immediacy in the contemporary scenes, the brutal standoffs, the fast talk on the ball court and at the barbershop, and, especially, the elemental conflicts of coming-of-age.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2008, American Library Association.)

January 1, 2009
Shawn spends the summer playing basketball and trying to stay out of gang territory in Compton. While considering whether to enroll in a high school outside Compton, he weighs the freedoms of a new school against the security of his old friendships. The gritty, urban setting comes alive through Smith's dialogue and descriptions of the hood.

(Copyright 2009 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)