The hart lived in a thicket close by a shimmering pool. He had been born in that thicket on a spring morning before the sun had quite gained the sky. . . He was an albino, born weak and white on that clear spring day." When loner Richard Plante, a sickly, bookish orphan of twelve, first sees the white hart "by the shimmering pool," he knows it's a unicorn. Heather Fielding, an "enjoyer," is less romantic: "An albino,' she breathed, and then was still." But when the two children meet "by the shimmering pool" (the phrase occurs over a dozen times) Richard talks Heather into believing his version. (" 'A unicorn,' Heather whispered, and then was still.") As each had already determined to tame the deer, they agree that she, as a pure maid, must lure it to her lap. Meanwhile of course the children discover each other—both, it seems, read Gerard Manley Hopkins—and Richard opens up. Then after an uncomfortable dinner when Heather inadvertently betrays their secret to her family and Richard spills Mr. Fielding's wine as he dashes off distressed, each is again convinced that (s)he alone must seek out the animal. But they meet again at midnight by that shimmering pool and the unicorn arrives on cue ("and where it stepped, flowers sprang up") and submits to the maiden. . . But then the hunters' horns signal the dawning of deer season and to save the hart Heather must untie the golden bridle (a yellow ribbon from her nightgown) and send the animal away. . . to a protected reserve. When Richard and Heather are awakened in the woods hours later, the wine-stained dinner napkin, tucked all the while in Heather's bodice, is white and fresh and fragrant. The relevance of this inescapably sexual symbolism however is less clear than the napkin, and the featured ideals of faith and purity, even solo responsibility and shared awakening, remain bloodless and archaic abstractions. To recognize this for the fluttery, self-consciously poetical fabrication it is, only compare the spring-in-November midnight miracle with the similar kitchen blooming in Pinkwater's Blue Moose, above.
Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1975
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: T.Y. Crowell
Review Posted Online: May 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1975
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs.
The Heffley family’s house undergoes a disastrous attempt at home improvement.
When Great Aunt Reba dies, she leaves some money to the family. Greg’s mom calls a family meeting to determine what to do with their share, proposing home improvements and then overruling the family’s cartoonish wish lists and instead pushing for an addition to the kitchen. Before bringing in the construction crew, the Heffleys attempt to do minor maintenance and repairs themselves—during which Greg fails at the work in various slapstick scenes. Once the professionals are brought in, the problems keep getting worse: angry neighbors, terrifying problems in walls, and—most serious—civil permitting issues that put the kibosh on what work’s been done. Left with only enough inheritance to patch and repair the exterior of the house—and with the school’s dismal standardized test scores as a final straw—Greg’s mom steers the family toward moving, opening up house-hunting and house-selling storylines (and devastating loyal Rowley, who doesn’t want to lose his best friend). While Greg’s positive about the move, he’s not completely uncaring about Rowley’s action. (And of course, Greg himself is not as unaffected as he wishes.) The gags include effectively placed callbacks to seemingly incidental events (the “stress lizard” brought in on testing day is particularly funny) and a lampoon of after-school-special–style problem books. Just when it seems that the Heffleys really will move, a new sequence of chaotic trouble and property destruction heralds a return to the status quo. Whew.
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3903-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
A forgettable effort that fails to capture any of the magical charm of Santa’s story. (Picture book. 3-6)
Wallace and Elkerton continue their series about catching elusive mythical creatures (How to Catch a Leprechaun, 2016, etc.) with this Christmas story about an elf who must avoid traps constructed by children before Santa’s annual visit.
The unnamed elf narrator is the sole helper traveling with Santa on his delivery rounds on Christmas Eve, with each house featuring a different type of trap for elves. The spunky elf avoids a mechanical “elf snatcher,” hidden in a plate of cookies, as well as simple traps made of tinsel, double-sided tape, and a cardboard box concealing a mean-looking cat. Another trap looks like a bomb hidden in a box of candy, and a complicated trap in a maze has an evil cowboy clown with a branding iron, leading to the elf’s cry, “Hey, you zapped my tushy!” The bomb trap and the branding iron seem to push the envelope of child-made inventions. The final trap is located in a family grocery store that’s booby-trapped with a “Dinner Cannon” shooting out food, including a final pizza that the elf and Santa share. The singsong, rhyming text has a forced cheeriness, full of golly-jolly-holly Christmas spirit and too many exclamation marks, as well as rhyming word pairs that miss the mark. (No, little elf-boy, “smarter” and “harder” do not rhyme.) Bold, busy illustrations in a cartoon style have a cheeky appeal with a focus on the freckle-faced white elf with auburn curls and a costume with a retro vibe. (Santa is also white.)
A forgettable effort that fails to capture any of the magical charm of Santa’s story. (Picture book. 3-6)Pub Date: Oct. 4, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4926-4631-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: Oct. 11, 2016
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