A darkly polished superteen adventure.
This YA novel stars a handicapped teen with special powers striving to make the most of his traumatic past.
High school student Benjamin Brown is new to Seattle. He escaped a turbulent home life near San Diego after his mother ran off and his alcoholic father crippled his leg. Now he lives alone, spending much of his time with his best friends, Maddy and Baffle, in Goodturn’s pawnshop. The teens witness the tiny, elderly Mr. Goodturn disarm and dismiss a robber without using violence. Goodturn reveals to Benjamin that he has a “knack” for slowing down time and another for manipulating people’s minds. Further, the older man knows that Benjamin has a knack, too. The boy can create illusions, and he uses playing cards to perform magic shows in parks. This earns him enough money to support himself and rent an apartment that’s decorated as if his mom lives there (her whereabouts are unknown). As Benjamin masters his knack—making new friends and enemies along the way—he and the tomboyish Maddy grow closer. Meanwhile, Baffle digs into Goodturn’s past only to find inconsistencies that force Ben to question his mentor’s intentions. Then there’s the eerie Miss Hoch, from Social Services, who’s been lingering like a spider in the corners of Benjamin’s life. Author Twitchel has conceived a hard-luck tale that would make YA scribe Jerry Spinelli swoon. He writes realistically likable—and loathsome—characters, and Ben narrates with a tough-as-nails voice he might have picked up reading pulp fiction magazines (Baffle has “a little angst, but what teen doesn’t have an account at that bank?”). Goodturn is an extraordinary creation, perfectly representing the ethical gray zone that many teens grow up protected from. He tells Ben that “to acquire wisdom a man must suffer, whether it is physical, mental or emotional.” And these characters do suffer—in brutal ways that mark this novel for older teens and adults looking for a page-turner in which the multitudinous plot threads never tangle. Twitchel’s cliffhanger perfectly lures readers toward the sequel.
A darkly polished superteen adventure.Pub Date: July 7, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-941142-82-0
Page Count: 386
Publisher: Jetlaunch
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The seemingly ageless Seeger brings back his renowned giant for another go in a tuneful tale that, like the art, is a bit sketchy, but chockful of worthy messages. Faced with yearly floods and droughts since they’ve cut down all their trees, the townsfolk decide to build a dam—but the project is stymied by a boulder that is too huge to move. Call on Abiyoyo, suggests the granddaughter of the man with the magic wand, then just “Zoop Zoop” him away again. But the rock that Abiyoyo obligingly flings aside smashes the wand. How to avoid Abiyoyo’s destruction now? Sing the monster to sleep, then make it a peaceful, tree-planting member of the community, of course. Seeger sums it up in a postscript: “every community must learn to manage its giants.” Hays, who illustrated the original (1986), creates colorful, if unfinished-looking, scenes featuring a notably multicultural human cast and a towering Cubist fantasy of a giant. The song, based on a Xhosa lullaby, still has that hard-to-resist sing-along potential, and the themes of waging peace, collective action, and the benefits of sound ecological practices are presented in ways that children will both appreciate and enjoy. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-83271-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2001
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