Transitioning readers will feel accomplished and will surely look for future volumes to see what happens in Mia’s new life.
In this first volume of a new chapter-book series, a little girl named Mia discovers she’s a superhero.
Mia Macarooney is “a total disaster machine.” Everywhere she goes, chaos and mayhem follow (literally, in the case of Chaos—that’s the name of her cat). Except now she’s received an unusual letter, inviting her to the Program for In Training Superheroes, and she is totally bowled over. It turns out her accidents are often results of her superpowers, which she will learn to hone in her after-school hours at the PITS. As if that weren’t enough of a shock, Mia’s parents deliver the thrilling news that they are superheroes too! Her father is fluent in animal speech, and her mother can fly. Everything moves quickly at the PITS. Mia embarrasses herself in front of everyone during the entrance exam but ends up feeling supported and ready to learn…in the next volume. Freckled, brown-skinned, curly-fro–sporting Mia is an adorable protagonist. An overuse of exclamation points keeps the adrenaline running without a steady stream of exciting events—or even a climax and resolution—but with the large, bold type and the cute illustrations full of personality, emerging readers will be happy to read this book independently. What’s more exciting than that?
Transitioning readers will feel accomplished and will surely look for future volumes to see what happens in Mia’s new life. (Fantasy. 5-8)Pub Date: Dec. 18, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5344-3270-3
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2018
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts.
Can knightly deeds bring together a feathered odd couple who are on opposite daily schedules?
Having won over a dragon (and millions of fans) in the Caldecott Honor–winning Knight Owl (2022), the fierce yet impossibly cute nocturnal, armor-clad owlet faces a new challenge—sleep deprivation—in the wake of taking on Early Bird, a trainee who rises with the sun and chatters interminably: “I made pancakes! Do you like pancakes? I love pancakes! Where’s the syrup?” It’s enough to test the patience of even the knightliest of owls, and eventually Knight Owl explodes in anger. But although Early Bird is even smaller than her mentor, she turns out to be just as determined to achieve knighthood. After he tells her to leave, she acquits herself so nobly in a climactic encounter with a pack of wolves that she earns a place at the castle. Denise proves a dab hand at depicting genuinely slinky, scary wolves as well as slipping cheerfully anachronistic newspapers and other sight gags into his realistically wrought medieval settings to underscore the tale’s tongue-in-cheek tone. Better yet, a final view of the doughty duo sitting down together to a lavish pancake breakfast/dinner at dusk ends the episode in a sweet rush of syrup and bonhomie.
An immersive, charming read and convincing proof again that even small bodies can house stout hearts. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2024
ISBN: 9780316564526
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 5, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound.
The titular cookie runs off the page at a bookstore storytime, pursued by young listeners and literary characters.
Following on 13 previous How To Catch… escapades, Wallace supplies sometimes-tortured doggerel and Elkerton, a set of helter-skelter cartoon scenes. Here the insouciant narrator scampers through aisles, avoiding a series of elaborate snares set by the racially diverse young storytime audience with help from some classic figures: “Alice and her mad-hat friends, / as a gift for my unbirthday, / helped guide me through the walls of shelves— / now I’m bound to find my way.” The literary helpers don’t look like their conventional or Disney counterparts in the illustrations, but all are clearly identified by at least a broad hint or visual cue, like the unnamed “wizard” who swoops in on a broom to knock over a tower labeled “Frogwarts.” Along with playing a bit fast and loose with details (“Perhaps the boy with the magic beans / saved me with his cow…”) the author discards his original’s lip-smacking climax to have the errant snack circling back at last to his book for a comfier sort of happily-ever-after.
A brisk if bland offering for series fans, but cleverer metafictive romps abound. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: Aug. 3, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-7282-0935-7
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Wonderland
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
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