An entertaining and insightful tale that readers of all ages will savor.
In White’s (Windows on the World, 2011, etc.) YA sci-fi adventure, a 13-year-old boy and his father escape a dystopian world by joining a community of tiny people.
Young Zert Cage, in Low City DC in 2083, earns respect by engaging in trash wars with otherteenson the streets. This involves the use of garbage-propelling rifles, which gets him arrested for felony vandalism. His widower father, Jack, is already worried about the latest epidemic of Superpox. Jack received his vaccination when it was affordable, but he can’t afford the current price of vaccinating Zert. Now, he fears that his son will be put in “Teen-Jail” for anywhere from six months to 20 years. The only solution, it seems, comes from Jack’s brother-in-law, Marin Bluegar, a celebrity due to his appearances on the adventureholoshow New Worlds. Marin wants Jack and Zert to take part in a top-secret project in which they’ll undergo a process called “minimizing,” which will shrink them to the size of thumbs. They have to leave everything in their old lives behind, but as a result, Zert will get vaccinated and avoid incarceration. Sadly, adjusting to life in a small settlement of shrunken people called Paradise proves difficult, due to its insect-based cuisine and locals who ostracize newcomers. At the center of White’s absorbing story is a teen who doesn’t fit in; for example, Zert’s peers in Paradise were born there, so they’ve never had electricity and don’t believe the boy’s accounts of amazing technology. The author also adds an element of suspense with the constant threat of the community kicking Jack and Zert out, as they only have three weeks to prove their worth. The novel even supplies a touch of mystery, as well; it turns out that Marin may have withheld information regarding the minimizing project, and Paradise residents often mention Abbot, the last outsider they banished. Along the way, White ably details the giant insects of Paradise, both as potential dangers and as ingredients in delicacies such as cricket soup. The occasional animal hybrids are delightful, too—especially a “bassetduck” that “quarks.”
An entertaining and insightful tale that readers of all ages will savor.Pub Date: Oct. 30, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-63299-194-2
Page Count: 266
Publisher: River Grove Books
Review Posted Online: Dec. 19, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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