Humor and heart make the pages of this classic quest story fly.
An intrepid boy becomes an assistant caretaker at a boarding house for dragons.
Child labor is the norm in the industrialized kingdom of Aldea, and 11-year-old white-presenting Olly Atwood needs to find a job. When he sees a cryptic notice posted at the employment office seeking a “young person” who’s “unafraid to die,” he figures it’s probably more interesting than his other options—and surely the part about dying is a joke? Upon presenting himself for the position, Olly is introduced to Dr. Lady Abernathy, who has dark skin, and the inhabitants of the boarding house she runs—all of whom are dragons. Dragons have been driven so far into hiding by human hostility that most people are unaware that they even exist. When Dr. Lady is poisoned by an unknown enemy, Olly sets out with several dragons to find the antidote. In his absence, his 9-year-old sister, Jenny, discovers the Dragon House and her own magical capabilities. The parallels between the treatment of dragons and the treatment of persecuted human groups are unmistakable, in part because the text occasionally highlights them so explicitly as to feel heavy-handed. Despite this, the delightful narration by the unnamed Royal Chronicler, complete with humorous footnotes, makes for an engaging read. Excerpts from books about dragons and Aldean history expand the worldbuilding. Enough questions remain at the end of the story to leave readers excited for the second installment.
Humor and heart make the pages of this classic quest story fly. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: May 12, 2026
ISBN: 9781419784613
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Feb. 16, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2026
An absorbing fantasy centered on a resilient female protagonist facing growth, change, and self-empowerment.
In Florence’s middle-grade fantasy novel, a young girl’s heart is tested in the face of an evil, spreading Darkness.
Eleven-year-old Lydia, “freckle-cheeked and round-eyed, with hair the color of pine bark and fair skin,” is struggling with the knowledge that she has reached the age to apprentice as an herbalist. Lydia is reluctant to leave her beloved, magical Mulberry Glen and her cozy Housetree in the woods—she’ll miss Garder, the Glen’s respected philosopher; her fairy guardian Pit; her human friend Livy; and even the mischievous part-elf, part-imp, part-human twins Zale and Zamilla. But the twins go missing after hearing of a soul-sapping Darkness that has swallowed a forest and is creeping into minds and engulfing entire towns. They have secretly left to find a rare fruit that, it is said, will stop the Darkness if thrown into the heart of the mountain that rises out of the lethal forest. Lydia follows, determined to find the twins before they, too, fall victim to the Darkness. During her journey, accompanied by new friends, she gradually realizes that she herself has a dangerous role to play in the quest to stop the Darkness. In this well-crafted fantasy, Florence skillfully equates the physical manifestation of Darkness with the feelings of insecurity and powerlessness that Lydia first struggles with when thinking of leaving the Glen. Such negative thoughts grow more intrusive the closer she and her friends come to the Darkness—and to Lydia’s ultimate, powerfully rendered test of character, which leads to a satisfyingly realistic, not quite happily-ever-after ending. Highlights include a delightfully haunting, reality-shifting library and a deft sprinkling of Latin throughout the text; Pit’s pet name for Lydia is mea flosculus (“my little flower”). Fine-lined ink drawings introducing each chapter add a pleasing visual element to this well-grounded fairy tale.
An absorbing fantasy centered on a resilient female protagonist facing growth, change, and self-empowerment.Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781956393095
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Waxwing Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
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