ISTARA'S TALE

In Nipun’s middle-grade fantasy, an ordinarystudent is transported via a mystery device to a pirate- and creature-infested planet where a rebellion brews.

Young Jimmy receives an unusual surprise from a classmate: a spherical, pocket-size device left behind at their school by “one of their eccentric professors, who had long been dismissed from service.” The mystery gadget reveals itself to be a teleportation machine that whisks Jimmy from his bedroom to the distant world of Istara, settled by a humanoid civilization that seems to dwell somewhere between the age of sail and steampunk. Exploration of Istara’s major landmasses is still a way to make one’s fortune, and pirates are a common—though apparently not very dangerous—nuisance. A gang of such brigands immediately ambush Jimmy and take his only item of curiosity: the space-time device. Jimmy himself doesn’t interest the freebooters one bit, but left by himself, the Earth visitor rapidly makes friends with Asani, a headstrong girl who’s a fugitive; her imprisoned father is a political rebel against the autocratic ruling council. For a while, the plot is simply a back-and-forth game of recovering and losing Jimmy’s teleportation device, until the third act turns into an operation to rescue Asani’s parent. The short length guarantees a zippy pace that middle-grade readers may appreciate, and there’s no romance whatsoever. The adventure is also relatively bloodless; in fact, it comes as a surprise to read that an off-page character is devoured by some of Istara’s wild beasts. The monsters are the most imaginative element, from bioluminous sea-lights to hulking, land-roving Walkhils—the latter so huge that their mighty shells support mini-ecosystems. Istara itself has other peculiarities, such as a size that’s much greater than Earth’s but with gravity that’s not much stronger; it also has a mini-twilight called a “daypause” that constitutes part of the 26-hour days. But even Jimmy is unsatisfied that his rambles end so soon, and the abrupt denouement, while not a cliffhanger, leaves numerous story threads unraveled.

A nontaxing, sometimes-creative exoplanet adventure for young readers.