Delightfully infectious.
Technophobic teenager Peter Dempsey becomes a computer whiz after being struck by lightning, flinging him into a crime caper that involves rogue prodigy Terry Williams and a new best friend named Granger, one of the many “packets” that live inside his computer.
The author deftly interweaves three stories: that of average Peter, a cynical teen with annoyingly attentive and happy-go-lucky parents and an older cheerleader sis; mischief-maker Terry, a tech whiz just out of high school who works for his wealthy dad’s company developing patches for computer viruses; and the characters of Packet World, “packets” being the little helpers that transport data throughout the Internet who only Peter can see and hear. The connecting thread of these three tales is a level-five supervirus that sets off Peter’s beat-the-clock effort to save his newfound friends–and the future of the Internet itself. With both humor (Peter mistaking the overly talkative packets for a “screen saver from hell”) and real-world analogies (Granger instructs Peter to “think of bits as atoms and packets as molecules”), Sheerin avoids alienating young readers with confusing tech jargon while injecting personality into an often-cold and geeky world. The characters are so sturdily built–from the foreshadowing of Terry’s destructive behavior through his high school pranks to Peter’s sister’s frustration at the virus cutting into her online chat time–and the scenes so meticulously detailed (Terry uses an all-night library to cover his tracks) that it’s easy to imagine this very visual novel as the next Pixar film. When readers finally see Terry’s dirty work from the packets’ point of view, it resembles a horrific, all-out zombie attack. Though the book might be a bit mature–Peter talking to Granger about “romance and even sex”–for the younger end of its recommended audience, older readers should have no problem logging in.
Delightfully infectious.Pub Date: April 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-1-934454-04-6
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Miranda’s book counts the monsters gathering at a birthday party, while a simple rhyming text keeps the tally and surveys the action: “Seven starved monsters are licking the dishes./Eight blow out candles and make birthday wishes.” The counting proceeds to ten, then by tens to fifty, then gradually returns to one, which makes the monster’s mother, a purple pin-headed octopus, very happy. The book is surprisingly effective due to Powell’s artwork; the color has texture and density, as if it were poured onto the page, but the real attention-getter is the singularity of every monster attendee. They are highly individual and, therefore, eminently countable. As the numbers start crawling upward, it is both fun and a challenge to try to recognize monsters who have appeared in previous pages, or to attempt to stay focused when counting the swirling or bunched creatures. The story has glints of humor, and in combination with the illustrations is a grand addition to the counting shelf. (Picture book. 3-8)
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-15-201835-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1999
Who is next in the ocean food chain? Pallotta has a surprising answer in this picture book glimpse of one curious boy. Danny, fascinated by plankton, takes his dory and rows out into the ocean, where he sees shrimp eating those plankton, fish sand eels eating shrimp, mackerel eating fish sand eels, bluefish chasing mackerel, tuna after bluefish, and killer whales after tuna. When an enormous humpbacked whale arrives on the scene, Danny’s dory tips over and he has to swim for a large rock or become—he worries’someone’s lunch. Surreal acrylic illustrations in vivid blues and red extend the story of a small boy, a small boat, and a vast ocean, in which the laws of the food chain are paramount. That the boy has been bathtub-bound during this entire imaginative foray doesn’t diminish the suspense, and the facts Pallotta presents are solidly researched. A charming fish tale about the one—the boy—that got away. (Picture book. 4-8)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-88106-075-5
Page Count: 32
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2000
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