A Carnegie winner noted for dramatic, psychologically intricate novels in which horses often play an important role (Flambards, 1968) creates an updated Black Beauty scenario for younger readers: the rescue of a pony whose abuse makes this book more a cautionary tale than a well-plotted story. Ros loves ponies, but her family can't afford one. When the raucous Smiths stake handsome Badger out on the public ground near the Safeway, she is at first delighted—he's lively and alert, and she can visit him—but she's soon appalled: The Smiths ride him harshly, feed him little more than the trampled grass he can reach from his chain, barely give him water. Ros's parents are concerned but helpless: Badger's condition is not bad enough to report to the SPCA, though they give that a futile try. With winter closing in, Ros and friend Leo make a plan: In the small hours, they lure Badger over a footbridge and leave him in the pasture of slightly disreputable Sid, who calmly begins to care for him properly. There are no great moral insights here; Ros's dad, when she breaks down and confides, is concerned and cautiously checks with the police, but Badger's absence has gone unreported—the Smiths are glad to be rid of him. Characterization, too, is minimal, though both kids respond unexpectedly under the stress of their exciting heist. Despite some deft writing and the harrowing depiction of the neglected pony, a rather ordinary story with a flat, mildly unlikely conclusion. (Fiction. 8-12)
Pub Date: March 1, 1992
ISBN: 0-385-30561-3
Page Count: 112
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 1992
With comically realistic black-and-white illustrations by Selznick (The Robot King, 1995, etc.), this is a captivating...
Nicholas is a bright boy who likes to make trouble at school, creatively.
When he decides to torment his fifth-grade English teacher, Mrs. Granger (who is just as smart as he is), by getting everyone in the class to replace the word "pen'' with "frindle,'' he unleashes a series of events that rapidly spins out of control. If there's any justice in the world, Clements (Temple Cat, 1995, etc.) may have something of a classic on his hands. By turns amusing and adroit, this first novel is also utterly satisfying. The chess-like sparring between the gifted Nicholas and his crafty teacher is enthralling, while Mrs. Granger is that rarest of the breed: a teacher the children fear and complain about for the school year, and love and respect forever after.
With comically realistic black-and-white illustrations by Selznick (The Robot King, 1995, etc.), this is a captivating tale—one to press upon children, and one they'll be passing among themselves. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1996
ISBN: 0-689-80669-8
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1996
Not for the faint-hearted—who are mostly adults anyway—but for stouthearted kids who love a brush with the sinister:...
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)Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-380-97778-8
Page Count: 176
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2002
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