"It's embarrassing to run into your parents when you're with people from school, especially when your parents are about to destroy the planet."
Sixth-grader Joshua has always had to contend with his parents’ secret identities, The Botanist and Dr. Dread—the Dread Duo. They keep trying to destroy the world, and Captain Justice keeps thwarting them. Now, it looks like Josh might be Gyfted (Genetic Youth Fluctuation, Triggering Extraordinary Development). He’s not sure how he feels about that. Does he want to be a supervillain? He certainly doesn’t want to shill for every product on the planet like Captain Justice. To make matters worse, when strange creatures attack the Vile Fair, a yearly expo for supervillains, the world’s most evil villains begin vanishing. When the Dread Duo fall prey, can Josh solve the mystery and save his parents? Bacon's debut is a fast and often funny entry in the kid-with-superpowers subgenre. Joshua, his normal friend Milton and new friend Sophie all contend with real preteen troubles (bullies and gossip) as well as those particular to the Gyfted. Dorman’s occasional black-and-white illustrations of the characters are a nice addition, but there are far too few of them.
A twisty, swiftly moving adventure sure to please superhero fans. (Fantasy. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 25, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-385-74185-9
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: July 25, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2012
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With Ivan’s movie out this year from Disney, expect great interest—it will be richly rewarded.
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Tiny, sassy Bob the dog, friend of The One and Only Ivan (2012), returns to tell his tale.
Wisecracking Bob, who is a little bit Chihuahua among other things, now lives with his girl, Julia, and her parents. Happily, her father works at Wildworld Zoological Park and Sanctuary, the zoo where Bob’s two best friends, Ivan the gorilla and Ruby the elephant, live, so Bob gets to visit and catch up with them regularly. Due to an early betrayal, Bob doesn’t trust humans (most humans are good only for their thumbs); he fears he’s going soft living with Julia, and he’s certain he is a Bad Dog—as in “not a good representative of my species.” On a visit to the zoo with a storm threatening, Bob accidentally falls into the gorilla enclosure just as a tornado strikes. So that’s what it’s like to fly. In the storm’s aftermath, Bob proves to everyone (and finally himself) that there is a big heart in that tiny chest…and a brave one too. With this companion, Applegate picks up where her Newbery Medal winner left off, and fans will be overjoyed to ride along in the head of lovable, self-deprecating Bob on his storm-tossed adventure. His wry doggy observations and attitude are pitch perfect (augmented by the canine glossary and Castelao’s picture dictionary of dog postures found in the frontmatter). Gorilla Ivan described Julia as having straight, black hair in the previous title, and Castelao's illustrations in that volume showed her as pale-skinned. (Finished art not available for review.)
With Ivan’s movie out this year from Disney, expect great interest—it will be richly rewarded. (afterword) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 5, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-299131-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 25, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2020
Categories: CHILDREN'S ANIMALS | CHILDREN'S FAMILY | CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES
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The Heffley family’s house undergoes a disastrous attempt at home improvement.
When Great Aunt Reba dies, she leaves some money to the family. Greg’s mom calls a family meeting to determine what to do with their share, proposing home improvements and then overruling the family’s cartoonish wish lists and instead pushing for an addition to the kitchen. Before bringing in the construction crew, the Heffleys attempt to do minor maintenance and repairs themselves—during which Greg fails at the work in various slapstick scenes. Once the professionals are brought in, the problems keep getting worse: angry neighbors, terrifying problems in walls, and—most serious—civil permitting issues that put the kibosh on what work’s been done. Left with only enough inheritance to patch and repair the exterior of the house—and with the school’s dismal standardized test scores as a final straw—Greg’s mom steers the family toward moving, opening up house-hunting and house-selling storylines (and devastating loyal Rowley, who doesn’t want to lose his best friend). While Greg’s positive about the move, he’s not completely uncaring about Rowley’s action. (And of course, Greg himself is not as unaffected as he wishes.) The gags include effectively placed callbacks to seemingly incidental events (the “stress lizard” brought in on testing day is particularly funny) and a lampoon of after-school-special–style problem books. Just when it seems that the Heffleys really will move, a new sequence of chaotic trouble and property destruction heralds a return to the status quo. Whew.
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3903-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 19, 2019
Categories: GENERAL GRAPHIC NOVELS & COMICS | CHILDREN'S FAMILY
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