Not so much a set of retellings as a creative romp through traditional and tradition-based story-scapes, compulsively...
The author of A Tale Dark and Grimm (2010) starts over—sending young Jack and Jill on a fresh quest for self-knowledge through trials and incidents drawn (stolen, according to the author) from a diverse array of European folk and fairy tales.
Foolishly pledging their lives to finding the long-lost Seeing Glass, cousins Jack and Jill, with a three-legged talking frog to serve as the now-requisite comical animal sidekick, set out from the kingdom of Märchen. They climb a beanstalk, visit a goblin market and descend into a fire-belching salamander’s lair (and then down its gullet). In a chamber of bones (“It gave new meaning to the term rib vaulting”), they turn the tables on a trio of tricksy child eaters. Injecting authorial warnings and commentary as he goes, Gidwitz ensures that each adventure involves at least severe embarrassment or, more commonly, sudden death, along with smacking great washes of gore, vomit and (where appropriate) stomach acid. Following hard tests of wit and courage, the two adventurers, successful in both ostensible and real quests, return to tell their tales to rapt children (including one named “Hans Christian,” and another “Joseph,” or “J.J.”) and even, in the end, mend relations with their formerly self-absorbed parents.
Not so much a set of retellings as a creative romp through traditional and tradition-based story-scapes, compulsively readable and just as read-out-loudable. (source note) (Fantasy. 11-14)Pub Date: Sept. 27, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-525-42581-6
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: July 24, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A teeming, action-packed fantasy liberally laced with Venetian history, for strong readers of both sexes; a sequel awaits....
Teodora, a bookish girl with a complex destiny, joins with Renzo, a Venetian boy, to battle the city’s impending destruction.
In 1899, Teo and her adoptive, scientist parents travel from Naples to Venice for a conference focused on the city’s shockingly dire problems. Rapidly heating water has brought sharks to the lagoon; wells are bursting, and children are dying of a hushed-up plague. Teo has always felt powerfully drawn to Venice. When a mysterious tome, The Key to the Secret City, clocks her in a bookshop, she enters a parallel Venice, “between the linings.” There, the evil exile Bajamonte Tiepolo is rematerializing, assembling a blood-lusting army of mutilated soldiers to avenge the city that destroyed them. With the Key their helpfully morphing guidebook, Teo and Renzo assist a community of protective mermaids and “The Gray Lady,” a librarian-turned–spell-tattooed cat, racing against Tiepolo’s dark triumph. Thickly plotted and encrusted with historical characters and fantastic elements (invisibility, an almanac of spells, transmogrifying statuary), Venetian transplant Lovric’s first effort for children is one grisly, bristling ride. A map, historical notes and a section entitled “What is true, and what’s made up?” shed light on the complicated allegory, but fantasy-devouring kids might well prefer the fast-paced horror to the historicity.
A teeming, action-packed fantasy liberally laced with Venetian history, for strong readers of both sexes; a sequel awaits. (Fantasy. 11-14)Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-385-73999-3
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
The wheels are grinding, but they haven’t quite fallen off yet.
Myklusch squanders much of the promise of series opener Jack Blank and the Imagine Nation (2010) with this unwieldy middle volume.
Intercepted messages indicate the mysterious Rüstov will spring some nefarious surprise upon the Imagine Nation (a land populated by “superheroes, ninjas, androids, and aliens”) in just five days, putting a deadline on young Jack’s efforts to counter the invader’s insidious computer virus. Some traces of the inspired whimsy that animated the earlier episode remain: Jack invents “Nuclear Knuckles” to crank up his fighting prowess for instance, and he encounters Lorem Ipsum, a texting teenaged superhero whose power compels her victims to speak only faux-Latin gibberish. Neither they nor occasional bursts of comics-style hyperviolence are enough to rev up a labored, wandering plot that eventually culminates in a climax featuring lots of standing around for talky explanations and exchanges. (An explosive closing twist is described only in retrospect.) The fluid prose style may carry patient readers through, though familiarity with the first volume is a must; even veterans may need reminders of Jack’s background, the significance of a certain major character who turns out to have been only temporarily killed off in the previous episode or even why the Rüstov are considered a threat. Myklusch promises a closing, or at least a next, volume in 2012.
The wheels are grinding, but they haven’t quite fallen off yet. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: Aug. 9, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4169-9564-7
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: June 6, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2011
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