A rousing and wholesome sequel.
The fearless apprentices are back with more adventures as they try and prove themselves as heroes.
Moxie Battleborne has become stronger, wielding her weapon like a proper Level 2 hero; Pan Silversnow, particular as ever, has increased her abilities—but Fart is still working on beginners’ skills. It’s been one month since they’ve been on their own after their masters were killed by goblins, and Fart yearns to be further along, mastering the most difficult spells. Now that the three have more experience under their belts, the Great and Powerful Kevin sends our favorite phibling assistant, TickTock, to retrieve the heroic trio for his next perilous quest. Kevin needs the barf of a bedazzler, a rare and potentially deadly creature. The trio sets off to the city of Wetwater in search of Diremaw the Dread, a menacing pirate captain who supposedly knows the whereabouts of a bedazzler. Along the way, they are kidnapped by muck elves, made to defeat the muck man SquishRabble, and robbed by a mischievous crew. Through it all, the friends stick together, overcoming assumptions about themselves and one another. Simple, humorous text and compelling action sequences from start to finish make this a fun, accessible read. Black-and-white illustrations convey helpful information in an amusing and succinct manner, often extending the meaning of the text. Pan is cued as Asian; Moxie appears White; Fart reads as Black.
A rousing and wholesome sequel. (Fantasy. 8-11)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-250-20638-1
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2021
A waggish tale with a serious (and timely) theme.
An age-old rivalry is reluctantly put aside when two young vacationers are lost in the wilderness.
Anthropomorphic—in body if definitely not behavior—Dogg Scout Oscar and pampered Molly Hissleton stray from their separate camps, meet by chance in a trackless magic forest, and almost immediately recognize that their only chance of survival, distasteful as the notion may be, lies in calling a truce. Patterson and Grabenstein really work the notion here that cooperation is better than prejudice founded on ignorance and habit, interspersing explicit exchanges on the topic while casting the squabbling pair with complementary abilities that come out as they face challenges ranging from finding food to escaping such predators as a mountain lion and a pack of vicious “weaselboars.” By the time they cross a wide river (on a raft steered by “Old Jim,” an otter whose homespun utterances are generally cribbed from Mark Twain—an uneasy reference) back to civilization, the two are BFFs. But can that friendship survive the return, with all the social and familial pressures to resume the old enmity? A climactic cage-match–style confrontation before a worked-up multispecies audience provides the answer. In the illustrations (not seen in finished form) López plops wide-eyed animal heads atop clothed, more or less human forms and adds dialogue balloons for punchlines.
A waggish tale with a serious (and timely) theme. (Fantasy. 9-11)Pub Date: April 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-316-41156-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Jimmy Patterson/Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Dec. 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2019
Another epic outing in a graphic hybrid series that continues not just to push the envelope, but tear it to shreds.
Pranksters George and Harold face the deadliest challenge of their checkered careers: a supersmart, superstrong gym teacher.
With the avowed aim of enticing an audience of “grouchy old people” to the Waistband Warrior’s latest exploit, Pilkey promises “references to health care, gardening, Bob Evans restaurants, hard candies, FOX News, and gentle-yet-effective laxatives.” He delivers, too. But lest fans of the Hanes-clad hero fret, he also stirs in plenty of fart jokes, brain-melting puns, and Flip-O-Rama throwdowns. After a meteorite transforms Mr. Meaner into a mad genius (evil, of course, because “as everyone knows, most gym teachers are inherently evil”) and he concocts a brown gas that turns children into blindly obedient homework machines, George and Harold travel into the future to enlist aid from their presumably immune adult selves. Temporarily leaving mates and children (of diverse sexes, both) behind, Old George and Old Harold come to the rescue. But Meaner has a robot suit (of course he has a robot suit), and he not only beats down the oldsters, but is only fazed for a moment when Capt. Underpants himself comes to deliver a kick to the crotch. Fortunately, gym teachers, “like toddlers,” will put anything in their mouths—so an ingestion of soda pop and Mentos at last spells doom, or more accurately: “CHeffGoal-D’BLOOOM!”
Another epic outing in a graphic hybrid series that continues not just to push the envelope, but tear it to shreds. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-10)Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-545-50492-8
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 17, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2015
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