He is insouciant without being witty, wise but not particularly kind. to the person who matters most of all.” Crenshaw stands for Jackson’s psychological freedom - to imagine, to love, to be honest with himself and his family. He says to Jackson, “You need to tell the truth, my friend. This is why Crenshaw appears to Jackson, after having vanished from his life for several years. He hides his pain from himself and his parents. Jackson has decided that facts are his friends. It’s as if Applegate set out to write a book about a huge mammal and ended up with a human family that she cared about more.Īs in “The One and Only Ivan,” repression is a primary theme. We go 10 pages, 20, 40, 100, with Crenshaw barely resurfacing at all. ‘It comes with extra Cheerios stuck to the seat.’ ”īut as Applegate draws this world closer to us, Crenshaw the cat recedes. ‘Who knows? Sunday at the yard sale somebody might give us a million bucks for Robin’s old highchair.’ “ ‘You do realize we can’t live in the minivan again,’ my mom said. Now that he’s going into fifth grade, it appears they may become homeless again.Īpplegate explores the world of working-class poverty with understated empathy and quiet humor. Jackson’s family has been homeless before, when Jackson was in first grade.
Jackson’s father has multiple sclerosis, which forced him to quit his job building houses. Jackson’s mother, a music teacher, was laid off during recent school budget cuts. Jackson and his sister, Robin, never have quite enough food. Jackson’s family, it turns out, is very poor. We learn that Crenshaw likes purple jelly beans (the only unbelievable element of the book up to that point everyone knows that purple candy is gross).īut another story line begins nosing its way in. Another huge mammal! But “Crenshaw” is not the book I was expecting.Ĭrenshaw the cat is the imaginary friend of a boy named Jackson. On the cover is a giant cat, sitting on a bench beside a small boy. So when I picked up Katherine Applegate’s next novel, “Crenshaw,” I was immediately excited. His frank wisdom about life, both human and animal, provokes laughter and thought his aspirations - to become an artist, and to liberate himself through art - feel universal. But the primary reason “Ivan” has become such a beloved book is Ivan himself. “Ivan” was a winning tale for many reasons: It was based, loosely, on a true story it addressed the issue of animal cruelty honestly, but in a manner that children could handle it was technically original, telling the story from Ivan’s perspective, in short chapters that read like prose poems. Ivan, the gorilla, frees himself and a young elephant by communicating with humans through finger-painting. In 2013, Katherine Applegate won the Newbery Medal for “The One and Only Ivan,” the story of a gorilla kept in a strip-mall circus.
A 400-pound gorilla casts a large shadow.
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