  | Full Text Reviews: School Library Journal - 04/01/2012 Gr 2–4—In the summer after third grade, Iva Honeycutt gives herself the new name "Honeysuckle" to go with her new identity as a "discoverer" and vows to find a Revolutionary War treasure she believes is buried in her town. She faces the obstacle of her own inexperience and the ubiquitous and unwanted presence of her cousin, Heaven. The treasure she finally finds is satisfaction in the effort and a realization that Heaven isn't so bad after all. Ransom complicates the story by dipping into her own Southern history to frame the narrative elements. First, the family: sisters, who married brothers, live next door to each other and then synchronized their childbearing so each baby would have a double-first-cousin-best-friend. In their town, Uncertain, grade-school children roam free and run errands on their own and have elderly widows for best friends, and every tertiary character has a memorable Southern name. Without any grounding in a historical period, all the talk of embroidered pillowcases and crocheted toilet-tissue covers will be lost on the intended audience, resonating mostly with middle-aged readers with a soft spot for their own bygone days. The story is well told, despite the confusion, touching on issues of self-sufficiency, pride, and forgiveness. For larger collections.—Lisa Egly Lehmuller, St. Patrick's Catholic School, Charlotte, NC - Copyright 2012 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission. Bulletin for the Center... - 06/01/2012 Iva Honeysuckle’s life ambition is to be a “discoverer,” and when she comes across a hand-penned map in one of her great-grandfather’s National Geographic magazines that hints at a buried treasure in her part of Virginia, she decides to spend the summer after her third-grade year looking for it. Unfortunately for Iva, Heaven, her bossy, omnipresent, “almost-the-exact-same-age double first cousin” (two sisters married two brothers) is always getting in the way of her plans. When Iva’s one friend, an older lady named Miz Compton, starts reaching out to Heaven, it is more than Iva can bear. By midsummer she finds herself friendless and no closer to finding the treasure, so she invites Heaven to help her dig under the local dump where she is certain the treasure must be. Iva’s strides towards having adventures and making discoveries carry the plot of the novel, but it is the relationship between the two girls that carries the emotional weight. Unfortunately, that story’s development is rather slim, and while the animosity between the two is effectively presented, the transition to working together seems more convenient than authentic. A handful of entertaining side characters from around town adds humor to Iva’s tale, but Iva’s family members are largely caricatures (the constantly costumed, irrepressible younger sister; the unimpressed, self-absorbed teenaged sister). Readers drawn to independent-minded girls with lots of self-assurance may nonetheless find Iva an affable companion for summer reading. Final art not seen. HM - Copyright 2012 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois. Loading...
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