Sisters Sol and Ming, immigrants from the Philippines, live with their bitter stepmother in a rundown apartment, longing for their deceased mother, drowned middle sister, and absent father. Stories keep Sol afloat, but Ming is shattered to learn that adventurous Auntie Jove is only a myth. Funny and heartbreaking, this character-driven novel celebrates friendship and storytelling in all their diversity and complexity. (c) Copyright 2016. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Two Filipino sisters living with their mean stepmother discover hope in unexpected places. Kelly (Blackbird Fly, 2015) returns to southern Louisiana in her second book. Twelve-year-old Sol has no family left except for her youngest sister, Ming. Soon after they immigrated to a small Louisiana town, their father returned to the Philippines, abandoning the sisters with their unhappy stepmother, Vea. Sol imagines herself and Ming as princesses fighting an evil dragon in order to endure their stepmother's verbal and physical abuse, their subsidized apartment building becoming a fairy-tale tower. She and her best friend, Manny, befriend a white girl from the other side of town, and Sol begins to rely less on her stories while Ming desperately holds on. When Ming announces that an aunt will save the sisters from their evil stepmother, Sol can't bear to tell Ming that the aunt doesn't exist. Always the strong older sister, she desperately searches for a solution before her heated relationship with Vea explodes. Kelly deftly captures the tumultuous emotions of a preteen who is forced to grow up faster than other girls her age. The book focuses mostly on Sol's inner struggles, however, and it lacks the momentum to turn its quiet characters into a full-blown tale that effectively handles the class and race issues that it touches upon. A promising story that doesn't quite find its footing. (Fiction. 10-14) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Gr 3-6-After their mother dies, Soledad and Ming's father brings his daughters and his new wife from the Philippines to the United States-and soon abandons them. Their stepmother, Vea, is angry and abusive, and Soledad spins stories for her younger sister to help them both survive. Themes of resilience, sisterhood, and the power of the imagination are interwoven in this tender, ultimately hopeful tale. © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

*Starred Review* Soledad's life in a small Louisiana town has its bleak aspects. The 12-year-old lives in low-income housing with rats in the walls, but worse than that is the evil stepmother who cares as little as possible for Sol and her younger sister, Ming. The girls came from the Philippines with their father and Vea, who only married him to get to America. Their father, however, returned to the Philippines, yet Vea keeps the girls for the assistance money. Despite all that is wrong in Sol's world, she has a soaring imagination: a punishment closet can transform into a castle, and her third sister, who drowned back in the Philippines, can appear like an angel. There is purpose in Sol's life, too: taking care of Ming and having fun with her friend Manny though his desire to kiss her seems silly. Kelly's sophomore novel is both hopeful and heartfelt, but strong emotions are only part of the successful equation here. Told in Sol's true voice, the direct dialogue brings the diverse characters to vivid life. For example, an elderly Chinese neighbor, who speaks almost no English, is so beautifully cast that dialogue isn't even necessary. One caveat: the lighthearted cover depicting Sol and Ming having backyard fun may suggest to readers that this is a breezy read, when in truth, it is so much more.--Cooper, Ilene Copyright 2016 Booklist

Kelly (Blackbird Fly) balances the bleak and the beautiful in a novel about the multilayered bond between sisters. Twelve-year-old narrator Sol and her six-year-old sister, Ming, live in a depressing, rat-infested apartment building with their cruel stepmother, Vea, who taps cigarette ashes into the carpet and locks them in the closet when they misbehave. Soon after the girls' mother and younger sister Amelia died, their father married Vea and moved all of them from the Philippines to Louisiana, only to abandon them and return home. In a supernatural thread woven into the story, Sol converses with the ghost of Amelia, who offers advice and helps Sol parse what is true and what is real. Fairy-tale fantasies and extensions of the tales their mother once told Sol contrast with her day-to-day life with her best friend Manny and a well-developed cast that includes an artistically inclined junkyard owner and a kind neighbor. While the story is resolved a bit tidily, Kelly's strong heroine offers hope in the face of loss. Ages 8-12. Agent: Sara Crowe, Harvey Klinger. (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.