A touch of creative magic tempered by love and kindness. Welcome back, Saralee.
Saralee Siegel is ready for a new holiday challenge following her Rosh Hashanah adventure, Once Upon an Apple Cake (2019).
It is the harvest festival of Sukkot, and Zadie enlists Saralee’s help in developing a new recipe for the family restaurant, as Saralee has an amazing talent for discovering and identifying flavors. The sukkah, an outdoor roofless shelter covered in branches and leaves and decorated with the fragrant etrog, a citron, is ready to receive diners during the holiday week. Saralee sets out a pot of water, and, inspired by the view through the open roof of the sukkah, she sends her nose sniffing into space until she finds the splendid smell of starlight, a scent encompassing all her favorite foods. Magically, the pot simmers and begins to glow like starlight. When Saralee and her family sample it, they each taste their own favorite soup. Her Starlight Soup is a resounding success, with every diner enjoying a different taste. But then something goes terribly wrong. The tastes linger, grow stronger, and become overwhelming and painful to the tongue. She finds the cure with the help of her best friend, Harold Horowitz, and the famed pickled herring sold at his family’s rival restaurant. Saralee tells her own tale in lively, conversational language, seamlessly weaving in information about the holiday. Her large, multigenerational family is eccentric and loving, proudly celebrating their Jewish religious traditions. Naming conventions and descriptions of activities indicate that all the characters are also Jewish, with Naalchigar’s accompanying black-and-white cartoons depicting wide diversity in skin tones.
A touch of creative magic tempered by love and kindness. Welcome back, Saralee. (recipe) (Fiction. 7-10)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-68115-564-7
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Apples & Honey Press
Review Posted Online: June 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Despite missteps, this satisfying follow-up will leave readers hoping for more magical adventures with lovable Jax and...
Jaxon and his friends deal with the fallout from the theft of one of the baby dragons in his charge.
As this sequel to Dragons in a Bag (2018) opens, Kavita, the titular dragon thief, introduces elderly Aunty to stolen baby dragon Mo. Thankfully, Aunty knows someone in Queens who can help return Mo to the realm of magic. Meanwhile, and in alternating first-person chapters, Jax is trying to find Kavi and Mo, as Mo’s siblings have grown ill as a result of the separation, as has Ma, Jax’s magical mentor and grandmother figure. Jax again teams up with his best friend and Kavi’s older brother, Vik. A third is added to their crew with “huge” Kenny, “the biggest kid in [their] class.” (Unfortunately, much is made of Kenny’s size, which feels gratuitous and unkind.) Eventually the trio finds Kavi, Aunty, and Mo, who’ve been abducted by a magical con artist. All’s well that ends well when Sis, the powerful guardian of the magic realm, shows up, but readers may wonder why the narrative decides to grapple with her choice not to intervene in injustice in our world. Her argument that human-caused problems are for humans to solve feels undeveloped, especially in the face of a massive injustice like the trans-Atlantic slave trade (mentioned during the climax and at no other point). Jax is black; Vik, Kavi, and Aunty are Indian American (though Aunty has African ancestry as well); and Kenny is white. The rest of the cast is diverse as well.
Despite missteps, this satisfying follow-up will leave readers hoping for more magical adventures with lovable Jax and company. (Urban fantasy. 7-10)Pub Date: Oct. 22, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5247-7049-5
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2019
A Christmas cozy, read straight or bit by bit through the season.
Neither snow nor rain nor mountains of yummy cheese stay the carrier of a letter to Santa.
So carelessly does 8-year-old Oliver stuff his very late letter to Santa into the mailbox that it falls out behind his back—leaving Winston, a “small, grubby white mouse” with an outsized heart, determined to deliver it personally though he has no idea where to go. Smith presents Winston’s Christmas Eve trek in 24 minichapters, each assigned a December “day” and all closing with both twists or cliffhangers and instructions (mostly verbal, unfortunately) for one or more holiday-themed recipes or craft projects. Though he veers occasionally into preciosity (Winston “tried to ignore the grumbling, rumbling noises coming from his tummy”), he also infuses his holiday tale with worthy values. Occasional snowy scenes have an Edwardian look appropriate to the general tone, with a white default in place but a few dark-skinned figures in view. Less-crafty children will struggle with the scantly illustrated projects, which run from paper snowflakes to clothespin dolls and Christmas crackers with or without “snaps,” but lyrics to chestnuts like “The 12 Days of Christmas” (and “Jingle Bells,” which is not a Christmas song, but never mind) at the end invite everyone to sing along.
A Christmas cozy, read straight or bit by bit through the season. (Fantasy. 7-10)Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-68412-983-6
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Silver Dolphin
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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