Uneven but exciting blend of anti-bullying PSA and Tolkien takeoff.
Boarding-school kid Chad thought that class bullies were bad enough, but then he falls into an alternate, magical realm, where he faces slavery (and worse) under predatory Orcs.
Though the title evokes a Piers Anthony “Xanth” whimsy, author Saur’s YA novel aspires to be serious business—perhaps excessively so, drawing upon themes of bullying, the horrors of slavery/human trafficking and violent death at the claws of cannibalistic creatures. Somehow, the genre-leaping stuff hangs together. After a heroic-fantasy opening in which a boy’s courage keeps the minion of an Orc master from getting a magic ring (yes, another one of those rings), we’re in contemporary Virginia. George Mason’s School of Boys is a rural boarding institution for castoff kids, mostly sons of dysfunctional rich families. In that environment, hazing and torment thrive under sadistic upperclassman Jason, protégé of the shady headmaster. Initially passive protagonist Chad is among a new class of 11- and 12-year-olds, deposited while his distant parents try to patch up their marriage. As his peers unite to stand up to Jason and his stooges, Chad keeps to himself. Half the book is a realistic narrative of the bullying (on an evolutionary scale below The Chocolate War) and the interconnected relationships of the young ensemble. Chad can no longer stay neutral when he gets pushed into a mysterious pool on the wooded school property. He finds himself in Eto, aka “Otherworld,” a Tolkienesque place occasionally open to Earth outsiders. He suffers brutal, degrading slavery in the thinly sketched society, where grotesque, man-eating Orcs (just like the ones in the movies, characters repeatedly say) are a coexisting race. Chad’s travails inspire a bloodthirsty Orc hunting-party invasion of George Mason’s School. This unites the boys, victimized and victimizer alike, against the fearsome foe. It’s a battle royal conveyed by Saur with considerable brio and deft action despite Orc fatalities far outnumbering the human ones (even a lucky BB-gun shot takes one monster out). That the storytelling is stronger than mere Peter Jackson fan-fiction helps canned lessons of teamwork, courage and bullying-is-bad go down better than a typical government-issued school lunch. But don’t go and make a Hobbit of it.
Uneven but exciting blend of anti-bullying PSA and Tolkien takeoff.Pub Date: June 26, 2014
ISBN: 978-1497398313
Page Count: 384
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Sept. 8, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A sweet, if oft-told, story.
A plush toy rabbit bonds with a boy and watches him grow into adulthood.
The boy receives the blue bunny for his birthday and immediately becomes attached to it. Unbeknownst to him, the ungendered bunny is sentient; it engages in dialogue with fellow toys, giving readers insight into its thoughts. The bunny's goal is to have grand adventures when the boy grows up and no longer needs its company. The boy spends many years playing imaginatively with the bunny, holding it close during both joyous and sorrowful times and taking it along on family trips. As a young man, he marries, starts a family, and hands over the beloved toy to his toddler-aged child in a crib. The bunny's epiphany—that he does not need to wait for great adventures since all his dreams have already come true in the boy's company—is explicitly stated in the lengthy text, which is in many ways similar to The Velveteen Rabbit (1922). The illustrations, which look hand-painted but were digitally created, are moderately sentimental with an impressionistic dreaminess (one illustration even includes a bunny-shaped cloud in the sky) and a warm glow throughout. The depiction of a teenage male openly displaying his emotions—hugging his beloved childhood toy for example—is refreshing. All human characters present as White expect for one of the boy’s friends who is Black.
A sweet, if oft-told, story. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72825-448-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: Jan. 11, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2022
Minor perils and likable characters make for a cozy and enjoyable read.
McCullough, who was a Morris YA Debut Award finalist for Blood Water Paint (2018), draws inspiration from her hometown of Seattle in her middle-grade debut.
On the surface, Sutton and Luis could not be more different. Sutton is a logic-ruled robot coder with a passion for hard science while Luis is a fantasy writer who uses his pen to go on adventures that his allergies prevent him from undertaking in real life. Both are from single-parent homes, and when their parents’ nascent romance grows serious, they are thrust together. Their first encounter is a bit of a bust as Sutton and Luis struggle to build rapport, but determined to give one another a second chance, the families decide on a hike. When the children are accidentally separated from the adults, they must learn to work together despite their differences in order to make it to their rendezvous point safely, in the process learning to confront problems and think with empathy and creativity. With chapters switching narrative focus between the two protagonists, their inner turmoil is handled with sensitivity, creating a character-driven tale that doesn’t skimp on plot. While Luis’ issues with severe allergies are explicit, Sutton’s struggles with emotional expression and sensory overload are never given a name, though they are likely to resonate with readers on the autism spectrum. Luis is mixed-race Latinx and white, Sutton is white, and the supporting cast includes Asian and LGBTQ friends and neighbors. The notable representation of female characters in diverse STEM fields is heartening.
Minor perils and likable characters make for a cozy and enjoyable read. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3849-1
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: Dec. 17, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
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