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ALICE-MIRANDA TAKES THE STAGE

Name: ALICE-MIRANDA TAKES THE STAGE
Author: Jacqueline Harvey
ISBN: 978-0-385-74333-4

From the Alice-Miranda series , Vol. 3

by Jacqueline Harvey ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 14, 2013

Harvey’s tale, featuring a comically inept, melodramatic villainess and a precocious heroine who is unfailingly kindhearted,...

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Seven-year-old Alice-Miranda returns in a jaunty adventure that combines mystery and theatrics.

Upon returning to boarding school after break, Alice-Miranda discovers several new mysteries to solve. A contentious new arrival, a neglected estate in the woods and an upcoming school play add intrigue to the new school term. Although the girls at Winchesterfield-Downsfordvale Academy for Proper Young Ladies are looking forward to collaborating with students from the nearby boys’ school on the play, a perplexing series of complications quickly emerges. Sloane, the school’s newest student, has an ulterior agenda. Her tasteless, social-climbing mother, determined to achieve wealth and social prominence, has devised a scheme that threatens to close the boys’ school. Naturally, Alice-Miranda seeks to uncover the truth. Harvey deftly incorporates clues for discerning readers so that the story’s dramatic conclusion is believable. Ultimately, it is Alice-Miranda’s act of kindness, when she compassionately befriends a lonely woman, that provides the key to solving the dilemma. Both fans of the previous stories and readers new to this series will enjoy the diminutive sleuth’s ability to solve problems with a signature blend of friendliness and clever ingenuity.

Harvey’s tale, featuring a comically inept, melodramatic villainess and a precocious heroine who is unfailingly kindhearted, will captivate readers . (Mystery. 7-11)

Pub Date: May 14, 2013

ISBN: 978-0-385-74333-4

Page Count: 304

Publisher: Delacorte

Review Posted Online: March 26, 2013

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ACTION & ADVENTURE FICTION | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
ALICE-MIRANDA ON VACATION
by Jacqueline Harvey

- BOOK REVIEW
ALICE-MIRANDA AT SCHOOL
by Jacqueline Harvey & illustrated by J. Yi

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CODY HARMON, KING OF PETS

From the Franklin School Friends series

by Claudia Mills ; illustrated by Rob Shepperson ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 14, 2016

Another winner from Mills, equally well suited to reading aloud and independent reading.

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When Franklin School principal Mr. Boone announces a pet-show fundraiser, white third-grader Cody—whose lack of skill and interest in academics is matched by keen enthusiasm for and knowledge of animals—discovers his time to shine.

As with other books in this series, the children and adults are believable and well-rounded. Even the dialogue is natural—no small feat for a text easily accessible to intermediate readers. Character growth occurs, organically and believably. Students occasionally, humorously, show annoyance with teachers: “He made mad squinty eyes at Mrs. Molina, which fortunately she didn’t see.” Readers will be kept entertained by Cody’s various problems and the eventual solutions. His problems include needing to raise $10 to enter one of his nine pets in the show (he really wants to enter all of them), his troublesome dog Angus—“a dog who ate homework—actually, who ate everything and then threw up afterward”—struggles with homework, and grappling with his best friend’s apparently uncaring behavior toward a squirrel. Serious values and issues are explored with a light touch. The cheery pencil illustrations show the school’s racially diverse population as well as the memorable image of Mr. Boone wearing an elephant costume. A minor oddity: why does a child so immersed in animal facts call his male chicken a rooster but his female chickens chickens?

Another winner from Mills, equally well suited to reading aloud and independent reading. (Fiction. 7-10)

Pub Date: June 14, 2016

ISBN: 978-0-374-30223-8

Page Count: 144

Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Review Posted Online: March 15, 2016

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2016

Categories:

CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES

- BOOK REVIEW
CALLIOPE CALLISTO CLARK AND THE SEARCH FOR WISDOM
by Claudia Mills

- BOOK REVIEW
THE LAST APPLE TREE
by Claudia Mills

- BOOK REVIEW
THE LOST LANGUAGE
by Claudia Mills

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TUCK EVERLASTING

by Natalie Babbitt ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 1975

However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...

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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.

However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the first week in August when this takes place to "the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning") help to justify the extravagant early assertion that had the secret about to be revealed been known at the time of the action, the very earth "would have trembled on its axis like a beetle on a pin." (Fantasy. 9-11)