This brisk, futuristic romp derives its energy from a hearty, multispecies cast.
In Arons’ middle-grade SF novel, a boy, his young friends, and their trusty animal companions help protect a planet.
On the world of Miro, Ameti Apprentices vigorously train to channel Orra, the natural energy that runs throughout the planet. This source of power can be dangerous if not properly controlled. Twelve-year-old Jimmy Aster and his peers finally earn their level-six collars, which come with sockets for Orra orbs and links to each Ameti’s AI assistant to help “keep that energy stable.” Each Ameti also has an animal companion who communicates via earbud. Jimmy’s is the snow wolf Bella, though he longs to find his previous otter companion, Otto, who’s missing. He gets the chance on a newly assigned mission—he and friends Tala and Derek (aka the Scouts) head to the jungle, where Otto likely is, to recover a crashed training plane. Also out there somewhere on Miro is a power-hungry villain who’s collaring Alpha animals to use as weapons. While his ultimate goal remains frighteningly obscure, he’s clearly plotting a devastating event that Jimmy and the other Ameti vow to stop. Arons’ second installment in this series is as animated as the first. The young apprentices brave Miro’s icy surface, utilizing various orbs (they heat up with a fire orb, for example) and relying on animals. Jimmy makes for an admirable and tenacious protagonist who takes accountability for his mistakes, including a rather huge one. Despite the distant-future setting, the characters are relatable; Jimmy is “just friends” with Tara, so why does watching her flirt with another Ameti make him uncomfortable? The story deftly incorporates an environmental theme as the villain’s quest for more power, which involves extensive drilling, could possibly set off an ecological disaster. While this sophomore outing sets up the next entry in the series, a few subplots reach welcome and befitting resolutions.
This brisk, futuristic romp derives its energy from a hearty, multispecies cast.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
ISBN: 9781969486012
Page Count: 274
Publisher: Spero Productions
Review Posted Online: Feb. 13, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel.
Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment.
Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. To start, in an alternate ending to the previous episode, Principal Krupp ends up in prison (“…a lot like being a student at Jerome Horwitz Elementary School, except that the prison had better funding”). There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). The villain sets off after George and Harold, who are in juvie (“not much different from our old school…except that they have library books here.”). Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. George and Harold link up in kindergarten to reduce a quartet of vicious bullies to giggling insanity with a relentless series of pranks involving shaving cream, spiders, effeminate spoof text messages and friendship bracelets. Pilkey tucks both topical jokes and bathroom humor into the cartoon art, and ups the narrative’s lexical ante with terms like “pharmaceuticals” and “theatrical flair.” Unfortunately, the bullies’ sad fates force Krupp to resign, so he’s not around to save the Earth from being destroyed later on by Talking Toilets and other invaders…
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-545-17534-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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