According to the author, Lady Bonquers is still remembered in “the international circle of pseudoscientists and mad...
The creator of useful field guides to monsters (2007) and aliens (2010) turns his attention to an eccentric Scottish inventor’s mechanical fancies.
Along with images of taped- or tacked-on rough sketches, scrawled notes, product brochures and schematic diagrams purportedly discovered in Lady Regina Bonquers III’s mysteriously abandoned castle near Loch MeeAhwey, Olander offers descriptions of over 23 marvelous machines. These range from a 40-foot-tall, garbage-recycling Crocobot Compactor and the protean household helper Chore Master X2000 to a pocket-sized Personal Grooming Robot equipped with pimple popper. Skating even closer to the boundaries of good taste, he also presents a tall and soft-bodied “Hugging Robot” built by the solitary Lady as her personal comfort object. Thanks largely to programming glitches and, often, attendant bad publicity, none of Lady Bonquers’ ingenious creations enjoyed commercial success, alas. Nevertheless, budding inventors may find inspiration in these pages (if not specific instructions or even clear details) for labor- and life-saving robots of their own.
According to the author, Lady Bonquers is still remembered in “the international circle of pseudoscientists and mad geniuses.” Here’s hoping that this tribute will expand her renown to a wider audience. (Fiction. 10-12)Pub Date: Oct. 9, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7614-6173-9
Page Count: 64
Publisher: Amazon Children's Publishing
Review Posted Online: Aug. 21, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Breezy and entertaining, with more than a few clever folkloric twists. (Fantasy. 10-12)
Hardly has intrepid Princess Ivy saved her father’s kingdom of Ardendale from one deadly threat (detailed in Ivy’s Ever After, 2010) than along comes another.
When magic beans delivered to newlywed fairy godmother Drusilla shoot prized pixie goat Toadstool into the sky atop an unpleasantly toothy beanstalk/Venus flytrap hybrid, Ivy soars to the rescue aboard her beloved dragon buddy Elridge—only to be seized by Largessa, a giant who has been sleepless for a millennium, ever since that thief Jack stole her singing harp. In consequence, she's grown understandably irritable and threatens to pelt Ardendale with massive rocks unless the harp is returned in a week. Where is it now? Deep in the treasure vaults of distant Jackopia, a kingdom that after 1,000 years of golden eggs is literally paved, walled, floored, decorated and armored with the glittering stuff. And will Jackopia’s single-minded King Jack the 102nd give the golden harp up when Ivy flies in to ask? As if. Endowing her 14-year-old heroine with engaging stubbornness and plucky allies—notably boyfriend-in-the-bud Owen the stable boy—Lairamore dishes up a lighthearted quest tale (with just a hint of romance). Endearingly, all wrongs result from egotism or thoughtlessness rather than malice and are ultimately righted amid a cascade of breathtaking narrow squeaks and truly monumental quantities of bling.
Breezy and entertaining, with more than a few clever folkloric twists. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-8234-2392-1
Page Count: -
Publisher: Holiday House
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
Not even in the same League as Scott Seegert’s funnier and far more useful Vordak the Incomprehensible: How to Grow Up and...
A phoned-in guide to world domination for the easily amused.
Nesbitt offers rightly characterized “brief period[s] of simulated education” (“Your arch is the curve on the bottom of your foot, so an arch nemesis is an enemy that you want to step on”) punctuated by boob, doo-doo and butt jokes. The author lays out a ten–or-so–step program for would-be supervillains—from becoming a genius overnight by playing more video games to acquiring evil minions and robots along with the requisite lair, look, cackle, motto and booty (“Hey! Stop that! Are you laughing at the BIG, SHINY BOOTY? You are?”). He also wanders off on tangents that will likely lose even his intended audience, suggesting such family-friendly pranks as resetting all of the household clocks and watches or periodically announcing that he’s taking a break or that his brother has dropped a hamster down his pants. Long’s small spot cartoon drawings supply neither humor nor relief.
Not even in the same League as Scott Seegert’s funnier and far more useful Vordak the Incomprehensible: How to Grow Up and Rule the World (2010). (Humor. 10-12)Pub Date: July 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-1-4022-3834-5
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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