by Barbara Laban ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 25, 2017
Friendship, perseverance, suspense, action—plus a little Chinese culture thrown in—this tale has something for most readers.
Eleven-year-old Sienna embarks on an adventure with her imaginary spaniel friend, Rufus, to find her missing mother and discovers much more than she bargained for.
Sienna’s art-historian mom, Kate, disappears while doing research in China. Now that Sienna and her dad are moving from London to Shanghai, she is determined to find her. It’s no easy task. Sienna speaks limited Mandarin-Chinese, and Ling, the live-in housekeeper her dad has hired, is mean and controlling, and she doesn’t let Sienna out of her sight. Even Rufus rarely visits her now. One day, while her dad is away on business, Sienna catches Ling doing something sinister and realizes she’s likely involved in Kate’s disappearance. Sienna manages to escape with only the clothes on her back and a tin box filled with her mother’s letters. Luckily, Sienna meets Feng, a young Chinese boy who knew Kate while she was working at the Temple of Fragrant Mountain of Pingdingshan in Henan province. Feng believes his brother and Kate are being held by the same crooks and wants to help. They decide to take the night train to Pingdingshan. As a disguise, the white girl wraps her blonde hair in a scarf and wears concealing clothing. Along the way, Sienna’s posse grows, the allies each accompanied by their own imaginary pet friends. Their dialogue adds some comic relief, while the suspense plot provides a modicum of tension. Sienna’s outsider view gives readers unfamiliar with Chinese culture some elementary introduction.
Friendship, perseverance, suspense, action—plus a little Chinese culture thrown in—this tale has something for most readers. (Fantasy. 8-12)Pub Date: July 25, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-338-11855-1
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Chicken House/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2017
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by Stuart Gibbs ; illustrated by Anjan Sarkar ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 5, 2024
Will satisfy fans but could be better.
Young CIA agent-in-training Benjamin Ripley switches sides—or is he just going undercover?—in this graphic version of the third Spy School caper.
Sticking to the plot of the 2015 original, this episode sees the talented math whiz recruited by nefarious organization SPYDER after being (unjustly, he fumes) kicked out of the CIA’s academy. While training in a hidden school for evildoers with other prospective villains, including Ashley Sparks, a gushy former competitive gymnast with a fondness for portmanteau words (sweet + awesome = swawesome), Ben gets wind of a dastardly scheme to make billions on government construction projects. Hot if inept pursuit by both rival espionage agencies takes Ben from a secret underground command center to the top of the Statue of Liberty. But while the action has a rapid flow in the art (Sarkar is good at portraying fights, high-speed chases, and explosions), several characters are drawn with generic features and such a limited range of expressions that even with help from the cast gallery, it’s hard to tell them apart easily. Still, along with coming through in the suspenseful climax—thanks to clever deductions and quick thinking—by the end, Ben has also achieved a long-sought breakthrough with Erica Hale (code name “Ice Queen”), a superbly omnicompetent schoolmate who has his heart as well as his back. The cast largely presents white.
Will satisfy fans but could be better. (Graphic thriller. 8-12)Pub Date: March 5, 2024
ISBN: 9781665931946
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Jan. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2024
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by Stuart Gibbs ; illustrated by Stacy Curtis
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by Stuart Gibbs ; illustrated by Stacy Curtis
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by Stuart Gibbs
by Annie Matthew ; developed by Kobe Bryant ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 24, 2021
A worthy combination of athletic action, the virtues of inner strength, and the importance of friendship.
A young tennis champion becomes the target of revenge.
In this sequel to Legacy and the Queen (2019), Legacy Petrin and her friends Javi and Pippa have returned to Legacy’s home province and the orphanage run by her father. With her friends’ help, she is in training to defend her championship when they discover that another player, operating under the protection of High Consul Silla, is presenting herself as Legacy. She is so convincing that the real Legacy is accused of being an imitation. False Legacy has become a hero to the masses, further strengthening Silla’s hold, and it becomes imperative to uncover and defeat her. If Legacy is to win again, she must play her imposter while disguised as someone else. Winning at tennis is not just about money and fame, but resisting Silla’s plans to send more young people into brutal mines with little hope of better lives. Legacy will have to overcome her fears and find the magic that allowed her to claim victory in the past. This story, with its elements of sports, fantasy, and social consciousness that highlight tensions between the powerful and those they prey upon, successfully continues the series conceived by late basketball superstar Bryant. As before, the tennis matches are depicted with pace and spirit. Legacy and Javi have brown skin; most other characters default to White.
A worthy combination of athletic action, the virtues of inner strength, and the importance of friendship. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-949520-19-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Granity Studios
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
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by Annie Matthew ; developed by Kobe Bryant
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