The book is actually quite short, but it turns out to be exactly the perfect length.
In theory, this adventure based in quantum physics could have gone on for another 100 chapters. In theory, it could have kept going forever.
The structure of the book is simple: Albie, an English lad, visits a parallel world, and then he visits another one. He does this by climbing inside a tiny Schrödinger box (the kind that held Schrödinger’s cat). It’s powered by something Albie calls Quantum Banana Theory. Scientists might quibble about the details. It really operates on what could be called the “Roger Rabbit principle”: it works because it’s funny. But like most comedies, the novel is based around a tragedy. Albie’s particle-physicist mother died two weeks before the start of the book, and he’s looking for a world where he can talk to her again. Many of Albie’s adventures are amusing or suspenseful, but each world is a little sadder than the last, because Albie’s mother is never there. Every world feels distinct and surprising, but Edge’s writing does have one odd quirk: a lack of physical description. Readers will need to use deductive reasoning to guess the races of most characters: Albie has green eyes and dark-brown hair, implying that he is white, and his best friend is a British-Asian boy named Kiran Ahmed. Albie’s reunion with his mother, when it comes, is utterly heartbreaking, and readers may be grateful they had so many chapters to prepare for it.
The book is actually quite short, but it turns out to be exactly the perfect length. (Science fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: May 30, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5247-1357-7
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A richly atmospheric page-turner—readers will eagerly anticipate the forthcoming sequel.
Young Seren Rhys stands on the cusp of a new life. Unfortunately for her, the train to her new life is late.
Following the death of her aunt, who saved her from her 12-year stay at the orphanage, she receives word that her godfather, Capt. Arthur Jones, will take her in. Seren spends her wait dreaming of the Jones family and their surely bustling, welcoming manor, Plas-y-Fran in Wales. An encounter with a mysterious man and his more mysterious wrapped parcel (containing the eponymous mechanical bird) leaves Seren reeling, and the mysteries multiply when she arrives at Plas-y-Fran. The place is shuttered and cold, nearly deserted but for a few fearful, oppressively unforthcoming servants. The captain and his wife are away; of their young son, Tomos, there is neither sign nor sound. With the Crow as her only, if reluctant, ally, Seren soon finds herself enmeshed in mayhem and magic that may prove lethal. In her characteristic style, Fisher crafts an elaborate fantasy from deceptively simple language. Seren is a sharp, saucy narrator whose constant puzzlement at others’ consternation over her impertinence provides running amusement. Supporting characters are fascinating if ambiguous players, not so much poorly drawn as poorly revealed, perhaps casualties of the quick pace. The deadened manor, however, provides the perfect backdrop for preternatural forces. Characters are presumed white.
A richly atmospheric page-turner—readers will eagerly anticipate the forthcoming sequel. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5362-1491-8
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Walker US/Candlewick
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2020
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy.
Inventively tweaking a popular premise, Jensen pits two Incredibles-style families with superpowers against each other—until a new challenge rises to unite them.
The Johnsons invariably spit at the mere mention of their hated rivals, the Baileys. Likewise, all Baileys habitually shake their fists when referring to the Johnsons. Having long looked forward to getting a superpower so that he too can battle his clan’s nemeses, Rafter Bailey is devastated when, instead of being able to fly or something else cool, he acquires the “power” to strike a match on soft polyester. But when hated classmate Juanita Johnson turns up newly endowed with a similarly bogus power and, against all family tradition, they compare notes, it becomes clear that something fishy is going on. Both families regard themselves as the heroes and their rivals as the villains. Someone has been inciting them to fight each other. Worse yet, that someone has apparently developed a device that turns real superpowers into silly ones. Teaching themselves on the fly how to get past their prejudice and work together, Rafter, his little brother, Benny, and Juanita follow a well-laid-out chain of clues and deductions to the climactic discovery of a third, genuinely nefarious family, the Joneses, and a fiendishly clever scheme to dispose of all the Baileys and Johnsons at once. Can they carry the day?
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy. (Adventure. 10-12)Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-06-220961-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
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