ALEX THE AMAZING JUGGLER
By
In Art Nouveau comic-strip format, an outlandish, anything-goes yarn about would-be young juggler Alex, his fussy, disapproving Aunt Sophie, and the entanglements Alex gets into by running off to join the circus--which involve a dynastic rivalry in the kingdom of Melonia, where civil war is fought with blue watermelons, and the invasion of Melonia by King Ludwig II of neighboring Zob, ""who loved, more than anything in the world, blue watermelons."" When the cannon-ball watermelons break, their ""bubbles"" turn into ""foam"" (that's what it says), turning the sea into a bubble bath and so routing the Zobian navy. (Aunt Sophie is last heard of dusting ""the clown's hats and hoops."") The book originated in Italy, where the half-carnival, half-comic opera antics may go over well; here it all seems like effortful fizz.