The debut YA novel from author duo Goebel and Jacisinova finds a group of teenagers fighting to prevent the next nuclear catastrophe.
Thirty years after World War III, the world—what’s left of it—has finally learned from its mistakes. All weapons and warfare are illegal, and a single world government is responsible for guarding the few remaining nuclear missiles. Control of this international body changes every two years, but instead of elections, the head of this organization is decided by a youth soccer tournament: Whichever team wins, its country’s leader controls the global government. China has won the past five tournaments, but this year, for the first time ever, the nation of Alaska has a shot at taking the title. Alaska, which is all that’s left of the former United States, is led by the all-star trio of Jason, the determined goalie; Cassie, a girl trying to prove herself in a boy’s world; and Reed, the brilliant striker and spoiled son of Alaska’s security minister. But history is doomed to repeat itself. Jason’s twin brother, Nate, sent to a secret government training facility after his soccer career was ended by injury, reveals to his brother the president’s plot to take over the world, win or lose. There is plenty of excitement here, almost all of it on the soccer pitch. The stakes couldn’t be higher, yet somehow the reader doesn’t feel the dread. There’s plenty of sneaking between rooms at the World Cup village, but the book is never clear on what, exactly, are the consequences of getting caught. Evil is rarely in the flesh: The president appears infrequently and briefly, the soccer coach is harsh but not sinister, and Reed’s father is more of a benign pawn than an actual enemy. The reader waits for the kids to make a stand or for at least the inkling of an uprising. Instead, the kids just keep scoring goals.
Young readers are sure to relate to these characters, but the book needs to spend more time off the field.
Pub Date: June 11, 2013
ISBN: 978-0615817651
Page Count: 300
Publisher: Menotomy Press
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2014
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own...
The sturdy Little Blue Truck is back for his third adventure, this time delivering Christmas trees to his band of animal pals.
The truck is decked out for the season with a Christmas wreath that suggests a nose between headlights acting as eyeballs. Little Blue loads up with trees at Toad’s Trees, where five trees are marked with numbered tags. These five trees are counted and arithmetically manipulated in various ways throughout the rhyming story as they are dropped off one by one to Little Blue’s friends. The final tree is reserved for the truck’s own use at his garage home, where he is welcomed back by the tree salestoad in a neatly circular fashion. The last tree is already decorated, and Little Blue gets a surprise along with readers, as tiny lights embedded in the illustrations sparkle for a few seconds when the last page is turned. Though it’s a gimmick, it’s a pleasant surprise, and it fits with the retro atmosphere of the snowy country scenes. The short, rhyming text is accented with colored highlights, red for the animal sounds and bright green for the numerical words in the Christmas-tree countdown.
Little Blue’s fans will enjoy the animal sounds and counting opportunities, but it’s the sparkling lights on the truck’s own tree that will put a twinkle in a toddler’s eyes. (Picture book. 2-5)Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-544-32041-3
Page Count: 24
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Aug. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2014
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