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Chloes Enchanted Attic

Name: Chloes Enchanted Attic
Author: Jerry J Yeaman
ISBN: 978-0615904290

by Jerry J Yeaman ‧ RELEASE DATE: Dec. 20, 2013

Not revelatory YA, yet an engrossing, easy read that should appeal to young readers ready for a fantasy adventure.

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In his debut YA book, Yeaman creates an action-packed adventure focused on a young girl named Chloe who’s unexpectedly summoned to save the world from the reign of an evil maharajah with magical powers.

Chloe is just a normal 9-year-old girl, coping with the recent tragedy of losing both of her parents to unexpected and unexplained causes. Her aunt and uncle take her to live with her grandmother Jen in the secluded woods of California, where she learns of enchanted animals and animate objects living in the attic. She makes the acquaintance of Mr. Oppum, a friendly opossum with a perfect British accent who explains that her grandfather, during his travels in India, acquired a magical purple jewel that grants household objects and animal friends the power of human consciousness and speech. Much to the dismay of Mr. Oppum, Chloe and some animate objects, part of the jewel is in the possession of the evil maharajah Rasheem, who’s abusing its powers to rule the world. In the company of Mr. Oppum, a mouse named Monty and a magic flying carpet appropriately called Mr. Carpet, Chloe travels across the globe to take the jewel from Rasheem and give power back to the people of Earth. On the way, she collects two orphan companions, Onri and Ayla, who want to kill the maharajah. This action-packed adventure starts off slow, with lengthy, uninteresting stretches describing Chloe having meals with her grandmother, sleeping and being upset about her dead parents. However, once the action kicks off, the story transforms into a fairly engrossing read with a violent climax and utopian moral. Dialogue can be repetitive and predictable, though the story’s strength lies in its well-laid adventure, which sticks close to the structure of a hero’s journey. Yeaman’s first novel doesn’t have much diversity in word choice and sentence structure, but it’s nonetheless a fine attempt at encapsulating the classic YA trope of saving the world, with some spirituality and environmentalism thrown in for much appreciated intellectual fodder.

Not revelatory YA, yet an engrossing, easy read that should appeal to young readers ready for a fantasy adventure.

Pub Date: Dec. 20, 2013

ISBN: 978-0615904290

Page Count: 202

Publisher: jerry yeaman

Review Posted Online: April 14, 2014

Review Program: Kirkus Indie

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

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ABIYOYO RETURNS

by Pete Seeger & Paul Dubois Jacobs & illustrated by Michael Hays ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 1, 2001

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The seemingly ageless Seeger brings back his renowned giant for another go in a tuneful tale that, like the art, is a bit sketchy, but chockful of worthy messages. Faced with yearly floods and droughts since they’ve cut down all their trees, the townsfolk decide to build a dam—but the project is stymied by a boulder that is too huge to move. Call on Abiyoyo, suggests the granddaughter of the man with the magic wand, then just “Zoop Zoop” him away again. But the rock that Abiyoyo obligingly flings aside smashes the wand. How to avoid Abiyoyo’s destruction now? Sing the monster to sleep, then make it a peaceful, tree-planting member of the community, of course. Seeger sums it up in a postscript: “every community must learn to manage its giants.” Hays, who illustrated the original (1986), creates colorful, if unfinished-looking, scenes featuring a notably multicultural human cast and a towering Cubist fantasy of a giant. The song, based on a Xhosa lullaby, still has that hard-to-resist sing-along potential, and the themes of waging peace, collective action, and the benefits of sound ecological practices are presented in ways that children will both appreciate and enjoy. (Picture book. 5-9)

Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001

ISBN: 0-689-83271-0

Page Count: 40

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2001

Categories:

CHILDREN'S GENERAL CHILDREN'S

- BOOK REVIEW
THE DEAF MUSICIANS
by Pete Seeger & Paul Dubois Jacobs & illustrated by R. Gregory Christie

- BOOK REVIEW
SOME FRIENDS TO FEED
by Pete Seeger & Paul Dubois Jacobs & illustrated by Michael Hays

- BOOK REVIEW
TURN! TURN! TURN!
adapted by Pete Seeger & illustrated by Wendy Anderson Halperin

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CORALINE

by Neil Gaiman ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 1, 2002

Not for the faint-hearted—who are mostly adults anyway—but for stouthearted kids who love a brush with the sinister:...

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A magnificently creepy fantasy pits a bright, bored little girl against a soul-eating horror that inhabits the reality right next door.

Coraline’s parents are loving, but really too busy to play with her, so she amuses herself by exploring her family’s new flat. A drawing-room door that opens onto a brick wall becomes a natural magnet for the curious little girl, and she is only half-surprised when, one day, the door opens onto a hallway and Coraline finds herself in a skewed mirror of her own flat, complete with skewed, button-eyed versions of her own parents. This is Gaiman’s (American Gods, 2001, etc.) first novel for children, and the author of the Sandman graphic novels here shows a sure sense of a child’s fears—and the child’s ability to overcome those fears. “I will be brave,” thinks Coraline. “No, I am brave.” When Coraline realizes that her other mother has not only stolen her real parents but has also stolen the souls of other children before her, she resolves to free her parents and to find the lost souls by matching her wits against the not-mother. The narrative hews closely to a child’s-eye perspective: Coraline never really tries to understand what has happened or to fathom the nature of the other mother; she simply focuses on getting her parents back and thwarting the other mother for good. Her ability to accept and cope with the surreality of the other flat springs from the child’s ability to accept, without question, the eccentricity and arbitrariness of her own—and every child’s own—reality. As Coraline’s quest picks up its pace, the parallel world she finds herself trapped in grows ever more monstrous, generating some deliciously eerie descriptive writing.

Not for the faint-hearted—who are mostly adults anyway—but for stouthearted kids who love a brush with the sinister: Coraline is spot on. (Fiction. 9-12)