A class trip brings a collection of misfits into a dangerous magical world. Iz and Helen are prone to outbursts, Mia has an autism-like inability to cope with people, Joe is a follower and all four of them do poorly in school. Along with Chris, a popular and brilliant jock, the four are thrown into a shifted dimension. There, guided by the troubled young Johan, they must pass a series of tests in order to return home and set the world aright. If they fail, they will die. The adventures give each of the teams a chance to shine. Joe makes instinctive leaps of logic when they need decisions made in a hurry. Mia, unable to understand people, communicates perfectly with a dangerous panther. Their epiphanies on the adventure’s conclusion don’t follow coherently from the adventures and lessons the five had, but are nonetheless satisfying. This uneven but enjoyable magical tale brings its outcast characters together: a magical version of The Breakfast Club in the English countryside. (Fantasy. 12-14)
Pub Date: Nov. 13, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-385-73367-0
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2007
The 12th book in the animated epic about the inhabitants and friends and enemies of Redwall Abbey, this is a grand, seafaring odyssey about Martin the mouse warrior and his treacherous return to the place of his youth. After the evil Vilu Daskar mercilessly massacred Luke’s wife and most of his tribe, Luke left his son Martin behind in order to avenge his wife’s death, never to return. With only the words of an old ballad to go on, an older and determined Martin, Trimp the hedgehog, and the mousethief, Gonff, set forth to battle weasels, water rats, aggressive crows, and tree vermin. Tricking the fox, Sholabar, into giving up his sea vessel, they locate half of the wreckage of Luke’s ship wedged between two monolithic boulders. Martin is reunited with four remaining shipmates who give him Luke’s journal; it outlines his capture by Vilu Daskar and plan to ram Vilu’s boat into the mammoth stones, thereby avenging his wife’s death and ridding the seas of Vilu’s treachery forever. Martin’s inner search and struggles with beasts of both land and sea will remind older readers of Homer, while also satisfying voracious fans of Jacques’s series. The formulas are gratifyingly intact as Martin discovers, as all fatherless children hope to, that his parent had not abandoned him, but heroically sacrificed his life for the welfare of others. (Fiction. 11-14)
Pub Date: Jan. 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-399-23490-X
Page Count: 374
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 1999
Against a medieval setting far away and long ago, Jordan crafts a passionate and sensuous tale. Marnie, 15, comes to Torcurra, newly wed to a lord twice her age. He brings her to a tumbledown cottage that belonged to an ancestor, and in two days falls to his death in a drunken stupor. The villagers are deeply suspicious of Marnie’s role in his death, and become more so when she befriends a wild boy believed to be possessed by demons. Marnie finds out that Raver, as he is called, is actually deaf; she renames him Raven and begins to communicate with him in rudimentary sign language. Her only friend is the village priest, who finds her recalcitrant but full of goodness. Beyond some bodice-ripper elements, Jordan adeptly conveys the rhythms of ancient country life, of the tides and the plantings, of festival and gossip; also nicely spun out is the blossoming romance between Raven and Marnie. Fire and sweetness, the pulse of daily existence, how to cope with differences, and the several kinds of love are all present, wrapped in a page-turner to keep readers enthralled. (Fiction. 12-14)
Pub Date: May 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-689-82140-9
Page Count: 266
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1999
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