Ben, Zara, Sam and Marcia return with six of their Professor friends in this sequel to 7 Professors of the Far North (2005). This time, they are helping Amy McAirdrie build an electric plane when they draw the notice of a secret, international, paramilitary organization. The Leader of Noctarma believes the kids and Professors have uncovered the long-lost secret of anti-gravity. They haven’t; but once our heroes hear of it, they know they must keep it from the clutches of villains like Noctarma. The race is on to find the real silver turtle. The kids succeed with a little adult help, and the world is safe again. Unfortunately, there’s no depth to the characters here. The children, save details of their pasts, are interchangeable as are the Professors. However, the action is swift, and the James Bondian gadgets abound. If spy adventure readers don’t mind a little coincidence-driven plot, they will be in heaven. Fans of the first will definitely want this one, and will hope for future escapades. (Fiction. 9-12)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-399-24382-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2006
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
It’s great to see these kids “so enthusiastic about committing high treason.” (historical note) (Historical fiction. 10-12)
Near the end of World War II, two kids join their parents in a plot to kill Adolf Hitler.
Max, 12, lives with his parents and his older sister in a Berlin that’s under constant air bombardment. During one such raid, a mortally wounded man stumbles into the white German family’s home and gasps out his last wish: “The Führer must die.” With this nighttime visitation, Max and Gerta discover their parents have been part of a resistance cell, and the siblings want in. They meet a colorful band of upper-class types who seem almost too whimsical to be serious. Despite her charming levity, Prussian aristocrat and cell leader Frau Becker is grimly aware of the stakes. She enlists Max and Gerta as couriers who sneak forged identification papers to Jews in hiding. Max and Gerta are merely (and realistically) cogs in the adults’ plans, but there’s plenty of room for their own heroism. They escape capture, rescue each other when they’re caught out during an air raid, and willingly put themselves repeatedly at risk to catch a spy. The fictional plotters—based on a mix of several real anti-Hitler resistance cells—are portrayed with a genuine humor, giving them the space to feel alive even in such a slim volume.
It’s great to see these kids “so enthusiastic about committing high treason.” (historical note) (Historical fiction. 10-12)Pub Date: April 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-338-35902-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Jan. 20, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2020
Compelling and accessible.
Steven must fight for his own life as well as for his baby brother’s when he’s offered a chance to exchange human life for something better.
Steve has figured out strategies to cope with many of his anxieties and OCD behaviors, but this summer the pressure is on. Readers see through Steve’s eyes his parents' fears for the new baby, whose congenital health issues are complicated and unusual. Readers may find parallels with Skelligin the sibling anxiety and the odd encounter with a winged creature—but here the stranger is part of something sinister indeed. “We’ve come to help,” assures the winged, slightly ethereal being who offers a solution to Steven in a dream. “We come when people are scared or in trouble. We come when there’s grief.” Oppel deftly conveys the fear and dislocation that can overwhelm a family: there’s the baby born with problems, the ways that affects the family, and Steve’s own struggles to feel and be normal. Everything feels a bit skewed, conveying the experience of being in transition from the familiar to the threateningly unfamiliar. Klassen’s several illustrations in graphite, with their linear formality and stillness and only mere glimpses of people, nicely express this sense of worry and tension. Steve’s battle with the enemy is terrifying, moving from an ominous, baleful verbal conflict to a pitched, physical, life-threatening battle.
Compelling and accessible. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: Oct. 6, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4814-3232-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2015
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