by Sarah Weeks ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2002
Laughs won out over tears in Guy Strang’s previous appearances (My Guy,2001; Guy Time, 2000, etc.), but not this time. Sitting in the hospital, waiting to hear whether his bosom buddy Buzz is going to live or die after being hit by a car, Guy flashes back to their friendship’s rocky start, years ago in second grade. Though Weeks again plays expertly upon the continuing theme of Guy’s struggle to be “normal” despite hilariously wacky parents—his well-meaning but feckless mother takes a star turn here, inspiring Buzz’s nickname with some disastrous barbering, serving chocolate/liver pâté as an appetizer, and trying to costume the children playing bushes for the class play in St. Patrick’s Day boxer shorts (“ ‘Clover is vegetation just like shrubs are’ ”)—Guy’s anguish and guilt give the comedy a tinny feel. Even with generous helpings of realistically juvenile dialogue (“ ‘You look like green boogers’ ”), the warm glow of strangers becoming best friends, and the eventual news that Buzz is going to make it, readers’ spirits are more likely to be weighted down than buoyed by this tearful episode. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-06-029492-2
Page Count: 144
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2002
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by Sarah Weeks ; illustrated by Lee Wildish
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by Stacy McAnulty ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 1, 2020
Cinematic, over-the-top decadence, a tense race against time, and lessons on what’s truly valuable.
A reward of $5,000,000 almost ruins everything for two seventh graders.
On a class trip to New York City, Felix and Benji find a wallet belonging to social media billionaire Laura Friendly. Benji, a well-off, chaotic kid with learning disabilities, swipes $20 from the wallet before they send it back to its owner. Felix, a poor, shy, rule-follower, reluctantly consents. So when Laura Friendly herself arrives to give them a reward for the returned wallet, she’s annoyed. To teach her larcenous helpers a lesson, Laura offers them a deal: a $20,000 college scholarship or slightly over $5 million cash—but with strings attached. The boys must spend all the money in 30 days, with legal stipulations preventing them from giving anything away, investing, or telling anyone about it. The glorious windfall quickly grows to become a chore and then a torment as the boys appear increasingly selfish and irresponsible to the adults in their lives. They rent luxury cars, hire a (wonderful) philosophy undergrad as a chauffeur, take their families to Disney World, and spend thousands on in-app game purchases. Yet, surrounded by hedonistically described piles of loot and filthy lucre, the boys long for simpler fundamentals. The absorbing spending spree reads like a fun family film, gleefully stuffed with the very opulence it warns against. Major characters are White.
Cinematic, over-the-top decadence, a tense race against time, and lessons on what’s truly valuable. (mathematical explanations) (Fiction. 10-12)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-17525-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: June 29, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
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by Stacy McAnulty ; illustrated by Claire Keane
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by Marion Jensen ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 21, 2014
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy.
Inventively tweaking a popular premise, Jensen pits two Incredibles-style families with superpowers against each other—until a new challenge rises to unite them.
The Johnsons invariably spit at the mere mention of their hated rivals, the Baileys. Likewise, all Baileys habitually shake their fists when referring to the Johnsons. Having long looked forward to getting a superpower so that he too can battle his clan’s nemeses, Rafter Bailey is devastated when, instead of being able to fly or something else cool, he acquires the “power” to strike a match on soft polyester. But when hated classmate Juanita Johnson turns up newly endowed with a similarly bogus power and, against all family tradition, they compare notes, it becomes clear that something fishy is going on. Both families regard themselves as the heroes and their rivals as the villains. Someone has been inciting them to fight each other. Worse yet, that someone has apparently developed a device that turns real superpowers into silly ones. Teaching themselves on the fly how to get past their prejudice and work together, Rafter, his little brother, Benny, and Juanita follow a well-laid-out chain of clues and deductions to the climactic discovery of a third, genuinely nefarious family, the Joneses, and a fiendishly clever scheme to dispose of all the Baileys and Johnsons at once. Can they carry the day?
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy. (Adventure. 10-12)Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-06-220961-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2013
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