An exciting, accessible romp with a hint of something deeper.
Thirteen-year-old Abel lives in Drakopolis, a massive high-rise metropolis built by humans and the dragons that they’ve domesticated for labor.
After failing his Dragon Rider Academy entrance exam, Abel is sure he’ll never be able to fulfill his dream of riding a dragon. But when he discovers his sister is secretly a kinner, or gang member, the world he thought he knew is busted wide open. Not only is his sister involved in an anti-fascist kin, one with progressive revolutionary ideals, but their brother is climbing the ranks of the Dragon’s Eye police force; now, his older siblings are fighting on opposite sides of a growing war. Furthermore, Abel’s best friend, Roa, and their favorite teacher are also secretly kinners, and they recruit him into the world of illicit dragon fights, leading to the book’s brutal, climactic kin battle. After training extensively with a stolen dragon, Abel begins to question whether the domestication of Drakopolis’ dragons is as benevolent as the history books say and whether kins are more complex than the simple right or wrong dichotomy he believed. These bigger questions are left open, but it is implied that they will be explored in future entries. This series starter’s straightforward language, intriguing worldbuilding, and thoughtful, gutsy protagonist make it widely appealing. Roa is nonbinary and uses they/them pronouns, Abel’s chronically ill father is unemployed, and most characters are White.
An exciting, accessible romp with a hint of something deeper. (Fantasy. 9-13)Pub Date: Sept. 21, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-338-71654-2
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel.
Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment.
Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. To start, in an alternate ending to the previous episode, Principal Krupp ends up in prison (“…a lot like being a student at Jerome Horwitz Elementary School, except that the prison had better funding”). There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). The villain sets off after George and Harold, who are in juvie (“not much different from our old school…except that they have library books here.”). Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. George and Harold link up in kindergarten to reduce a quartet of vicious bullies to giggling insanity with a relentless series of pranks involving shaving cream, spiders, effeminate spoof text messages and friendship bracelets. Pilkey tucks both topical jokes and bathroom humor into the cartoon art, and ups the narrative’s lexical ante with terms like “pharmaceuticals” and “theatrical flair.” Unfortunately, the bullies’ sad fates force Krupp to resign, so he’s not around to save the Earth from being destroyed later on by Talking Toilets and other invaders…
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-545-17534-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
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Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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