Imaginative and engaging magical fiction.
A Hawaii-set, paranormal middle-grade series starter that tells a story about the power of friendship and sacrifice.
Spudich (The Ice Giant, 2019, etc.) presents an exciting tale of a hidden world of sorcerers, goddesses, and people with elemental powers. Tess and her three friends, Amelia, Susie, and Elizabeth, have a bond that’s reflected in the necklaces they wear, highlighting the four elements: fire, water, earth, and air. However, as they get ready to start high school, Amelia’s closeness with her friend Tess, who suffers from a lack of confidence, seems to be fading. The other girls face their own challenges; for example, Elizabeth shows a lack of interest in exercise, and Susie is starting to show impulsive behavior. When Amelia’s sorcerer father, whom she’s never met, suddenly kidnaps her, she embarks on a surprising adventure involving the use of magic. Amelia eventually meets a surprising ally named Akoni; he helps her fight back against her father, who wants Amelia to join him in his dark magic endeavors. Through clever problem-solving and the use of a few magical items, the girls manage to locate Amelia, but their challenges aren’t over. Over the course of this book, Spudich maintains an atmosphere of peril that keeps the pace lively, but she never makes any scenes too scary for older elementary school–age readers to enjoy. The conclusion offers the touching lesson that people can change but still remain close friends. The prose style is simple and straightforward throughout, but the characters are, by contrast, quite complex; the unsure Tess and Amelia’s sorcerer father are each particularly well developed. Young fans of fantastical fiction will also enjoy this book’s magic system, which is inventive without being overly complicated.
Imaginative and engaging magical fiction.Pub Date: May 27, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-947854-50-5
Page Count: 366
Publisher: Handersen Publishing
Review Posted Online: Oct. 1, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
APPRECIATIONS
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