March 27, 2017
The latest in Hogarth’s Shakespeare series finds Chevalier (Girl with a Pearl Earring) relocating Othello to Washington, D.C., in the early 1970s, where sixth grader Osei, the son of a Ghanaian diplomat, faces his first morning at a new elementary school, his fourth in six years. The day starts well, as Osei meets popular girl Dee and the pair fall head over heels in love. But seeing the school’s only black boy woo a white girl is too much for Ian, a schoolyard bully, and he hatches a plan to ruin their blossoming relationship. Ian drags others into his manipulations, and by the end of the school day, hearts are broken and tragedy strikes the normally placid schoolyard. Chevalier smartly uses her narrative as an opportunity to spin a story commenting on racism in America, and while she weaves Shakespeare’s narrative arc into her novel by bouncing between characters’ experiences, the final result is only moderately effective. By compressing everything into one morning and afternoon, Chevalier rushes some action, and while the reader may recognize how children tend to amplify emotions, moments are occasionally difficult to believe.
October 15, 2017
Chevalier (Girl with a Pearl Earring) takes a surprising narrative path with the Bard in tow: her privileged fifth graders play out Othello in a suburban Washington, DC, elementary school in 1974. The star here is narrator Prentice Onayemi, whose melodious, wide-ranging, gender-adaptive narration steals the show. The eponymous "new boy" is Osei, a diplomat's son originally from Ghana, who enters his fourth new school in six years. He, too, is "a diplomat of sorts"; as the only black student--and notably cosmopolitan with previous stopovers in London, Rome, and New York--Osei is no stranger to racism, both casual and targeted, especially from adults who should know and do better. He's befriended by popular girl Dee, and their burgeoning relationship quickly catches the envious attention of bully Ian, setting in motion inevitable consequences of childhood cruelty. VERDICT Onayemi unmistakably enhances what's on the page, proving again that the Bard is better performed than silently read. Libraries will not want to miss adding the latest series title. ["The emotional lives of 12-year-olds don't quite seem up to the weight of Shakespearean tragedy": LJ 4/15/17 review of the Hogarth: Crown hc.]--Terry Hong, Smithsonian BookDragon, Washington, DC
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