A dense but absorbing adventure packed with overt literary references and layers of meaning.
Animals, guided by a mysterious boy, seek to defeat their brutal feline overlords in this multilayered fantasy intended for middle school readers.
In the Five Kingdoms, all animals live on a single landmass bordered by ice and a desert wasteland. It’s a dark time for those at the mercy of the brutal Felines (lions and tigers) and King Roar, the most brutal of all. In an adventure with overtones of Orwell’s Animal Farm and C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia series (two influences the author cites in his copious aftermatter), the Felines’ rule is challenged by the near-mystical appearance of a 10-year-old human, General Jack. He inspires Miaow, the diffident chief of the small cats and the book’s primary narrator, to find the resolve to unite the disparate, fearful, and suspicious animal species in an attempt to oust the Feline overlords. The author weaves Miaow’s self-doubts through thickets of detail about this animal-centric world, its inhabitants, and the social hierarchy that controls them. The battle plan and its “farcical” execution due to missed signals, panic, and impatience, are exhaustively described and detailed in black-and-white charts. (The book’s effective illustrations, uncredited, are mostly small, black silhouettes of objects, settings, and characters.) What happens after the battle encompasses Jack’s eventual departure for a land unknown, the profound changes that occur in the animals’ world, and how the truth of what happened is eventually manipulated and obscured by ambitious propagandists. According to the notes that follow, this is the second book of a planned trilogy. General Jack is the older version of the 5-year-old protagonist in Bush’s debut chapter book (The Joyous Adventures of Whizzojack, 2015). (The readership for each book may be intended to reflect Jack’s age, but the complex layers here skew to teens, not preteens.) Although General Jack’s inspirational counsel to Miaow thuds at times with such platitudes as “where there’s a will there’s a way,” and “don’t judge by appearances,” his surprising return and his gentle, Aslan-like treatment of Miaow are genuinely moving, lending intrigue to who Jack will be in the third book of the trilogy.
A dense but absorbing adventure packed with overt literary references and layers of meaning. (author bio)Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 979-8-66-722641-3
Page Count: 189
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Oct. 6, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Certain to steal hearts.
In this follow-up to 2020’s The One and Only Bob, Ruby the elephant is still living at Wildworld Zoological Park and Sanctuary.
She’s apprehensive about her Tuskday, a rite of passage for young elephants when she’ll give a speech in front of the rest of the herd. Luckily, she can confide in her Uncle Ivan, who is next door in Gorilla World, and Uncle Bob, the dog who lives nearby with human friend Julia. Ruby was born in an unspecified part of Africa, later ending up on display in the mall, where she met Ivan, Bob, and Julia. The unexpected arrival of someone from Ruby’s past life on the savanna revives memories both warmly nostalgic and deeply traumatic. An elephant glossary and Castelao’s charming, illustrated guide to elephant body language help immerse readers in Ruby’s world. Goofy, playful, and mischievous Ruby is fully dimensional, as she has shown her bravery during the many hardships of her young life. Applegate deftly tempers themes of grief and loss with compassion and humor as Ruby finds her place in the herd. The author’s note touches on climate change, the illegal ivory trade, and conservation efforts, but the highly emotive framing of the story through the memories of a bewildered baby elephant emphasizes the impact of lines such as “ ‘in Africa,’ I say softly, ‘there were bad people,’ ” without offering readers a nuanced understanding of the broader context that drives poaching.
Certain to steal hearts. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9780063080089
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2023
A sympathetic, compelling introduction to wolves from the perspective of one wolf and his memorable journey.
Separated from his pack, Swift, a young wolf, embarks on a perilous search for a new home.
Swift’s mother impresses on him early that his “pack belongs to the mountains and the mountains belong to the pack.” His father teaches him to hunt elk, avoid skunks and porcupines, revere the life that gives them life, and “carry on” when their pack is devastated in an attack by enemy wolves. Alone and grieving, Swift reluctantly leaves his mountain home. Crossing into unfamiliar territory, he’s injured and nearly dies, but the need to run, hunt, and live drives him on. Following a routine of “walk-trot-eat-rest,” Swift traverses prairies, canyons, and deserts, encountering men with rifles, hunger, thirst, highways, wild horses, a cougar, and a forest fire. Never imagining the “world could be so big or that I could be so alone in it,” Swift renames himself Wander as he reaches new mountains and finds a new home. Rife with details of the myriad scents, sounds, tastes, touches, and sights in Swift/Wander’s primal existence, the immediacy of his intimate, first-person, present-tense narration proves deeply moving, especially his longing for companionship. Realistic black-and-white illustrations trace key events in this unique survival story, and extensive backmatter fills in further factual information about wolves and their habitat.
A sympathetic, compelling introduction to wolves from the perspective of one wolf and his memorable journey. (additional resources, map) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 7, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-289593-6
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2019
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