A satisfying, compelling adventure with an original magical construct and bright, appealing protagonists.
Art comes alive with the help of magic.
Rising fourth grader Aleksandra “ZuZu” Zieuzieulowicz and her new neighbor and classmate, Andrew Chang, are caught up in a return-from-the-dead vengeance plot when they visit a local haunted mansion. They find, in a secret compartment, a set of watercolors and drawing pens seemingly meant for them. The art supplies are infused with magical properties and produce visitons—animated, three-dimensional creatures—when the children combine their drawing and painting skills. Martha Mapleton, who long ago lived in the mansion, explains this to the pair when they bring her charcoal self-portrait to life by completing a missing portion. Martha’s malevolent brother, Chester, has held a childhood grudge for a lifetime and beyond. He reanimates himself and numerous auditons—dastardly musical creations—with the assistance of a self-absorbed classmate of ZuZu’s, intending to wreak havoc on his bully’s descendants. Martha plans to stop him. Entertainingly inventive visitons—some informed by the imagination of ZuZu’s younger brother—battle Chester’s wicked auditons in an energetic, epic showdown. ZuZu, whose best friend moved away, feels like an outcast; the temptation to hold on to resentment is addressed subtly and with kindness. ZuZu reads as White; Taiwanese American Andrew’s diagnosis of Crohn’s disease is discussed in an author’s note.
A satisfying, compelling adventure with an original magical construct and bright, appealing protagonists. (Fantasy. 8-11)Pub Date: May 3, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-72841-567-3
Page Count: 328
Publisher: Carolrhoda
Review Posted Online: Feb. 8, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A fizzy mix of low humor and brisk action, with promise of more of both to come.
Heroic deeds await Isaac after his little sister runs into the school basement and is captured by elves.
Even though their school is a spooky old castle transplanted stone by stone from Germany, Isaac and his two friends, Max and Emma, little suspect that an entire magical kingdom lies beneath—a kingdom run by elves, policed by oversized rats in uniform, and populated by captives who start out human but undergo transformative “weirding.” These revelations await Isaac and sidekicks as they nerve themselves to trail his bossy younger sib, Lily, through a shadowy storeroom and into a tunnel, across a wide lake, and into a city lit by half-human fireflies, where they are cast together into a dungeon. Can they escape before they themselves start changing? Gibson pits his doughty rescuers against such adversaries as an elven monarch who emits truly kingly belches and a once-human jailer with a self-picking nose. Tests of mettle range from a riddle contest to a face-off with the menacing head rat Shelfliver, and a helter-skelter chase finally leads rescuers and rescued back to the aboveground. Plainly, though, there is further rescuing to be done.
A fizzy mix of low humor and brisk action, with promise of more of both to come. (Fantasy. 9-11)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-62370-255-7
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Capstone Young Readers
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2015
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