Comic adventures and serious courage mix well in this middle-grade novel.
In this comedy/horror chapter book, a boy sleepwalks into another world where he must fight a demon.
The night before starting sixth grade, Brady is nervous and can’t sleep. What if other kids hate him, or ignore him, or give him a horrible nickname? “Oh no—they were going to call him Snotface. It was official,” he worries. Finally drifting off, Brady finds himself standing asleep before his mirror, which summons his spirit into another world. A sinister demon tells Brady that he can’t go home until he completes a quest: return the demon’s lost pet beast, Sheila, from the Dangerous Forest. Journeying and noting events in his diary, Brady meets elflike creatures called the Ground Folk, who were chased into the Forest by the demon. They address Brady as “The One.” The Great Elder proposes that Brady act as a Trojan horse and attack the demon with the aid of Sheila, and the Ground Folk will join in. But this plan goes awry, and the Folk, with Brady, retreat to Horizon City. When the demon attacks the city at the head of an army of Molts, similar to dwarves, a fierce battle ensues. With the help of the wise Lady of the City, Brady must test his bravery before returning home to his bed and sixth grade. Shah (Adult Coloring Book Horror Land: Devil’s Child, 2017, etc.) leaves behind his usual comedy gross-out theme for this equally entertaining fantasy adventure. Though the book leans on standard tropes (the portal, the quest, the prophesied savior), Shah doesn’t take them too seriously. Instead, the tropes serve as a framework for comedy, of which there’s plenty, and for Brady’s personal growth. This means not just becoming braver, but more empathetic. When Brady sees his friend Lym and other Ground Folk joining the fight against the demon, he realizes that “I couldn’t let her fight. As brave as she was, she wouldn’t survive.” With new determination, he confronts the demon head-on. Sixth grade will be peanuts.
Comic adventures and serious courage mix well in this middle-grade novel.Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2017
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 83
Publisher: 99 Pages or Less Publishing
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Plenty of suspense and more heart than your average mystery.
An absorbing murder mystery with the right number of moving parts.
It’s hard to say who exactly is the protagonist of Jenkins’ debut novel, though its central figure—the murder victim—looms large throughout. Harley Groves, a Korean War vet who walks using a pair of ingeniously engineered rockers after having lost both feet, is kind and remarkably progressive for mid-20th-century East Texas. After a brief prologue in which we learn of his death, the first part of the book follows Harley’s life after returning home to Longview, Texas, in 1952. Harley opened a pool hall on his property (the eponymous Chicken Shack) and hired Charlie Hiller and Willie Washington, two preteen boys, one white and one black. He became their mentor. Despite the town’s palpable racial tension, Harley fell in love with Willie’s older sister Ramona. Sadly, few of the residents of Longview were as forward-thinking as Groves, and one fateful night, some customers’ intolerance drove him to violence. In 1982, Harley and Ramona are living a quiet, private life; the Chicken Shack has been long shuttered, and developers are hungry for land—especially the 200 acres Harley owns. Jenkins adroitly introduces plenty of characters with plenty of motive before the deed is done, so to speak, and Ramona is left to prove her partner’s death was not a suicide. In a convenient plot development, Charlie Hiller and Willie Washington have both gone on to be wealthy, successful men and devote themselves to solving the case. While these two are the most one-dimensional of the book’s characters, thankfully most of the actual sleuthing falls to Hiller’s beautiful PI friend Jules Elizondo—a brave and whip-smart woman with no qualms about using her looks to put men at ease. Funny and engaging, in Jules, Jenkins has created a character who could easily carry a mystery series of her own. When she finally determines the identity of Harley’s killer, it’s a surprising turn.
Plenty of suspense and more heart than your average mystery.Pub Date: April 25, 2011
ISBN: 978-1936780334
Page Count: 306
Publisher: Mill City Press
Review Posted Online: July 16, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An adventure story with an engaging plot but underdeveloped craft.
In this debut memoir, a woman details her life-changing sailing experience in the Caribbean.
After her mother’s death, Bukruian buys a boat to fulfill her lifelong dream of becoming a “sea gypsy.” At the beginning of her journey, she meets a fellow sailor named Ed and quickly becomes infatuated. They then embark on a tumultuous journey in the Caribbean, each in their respective boats. Throughout her sailing experience, Bukruian learns how to be self-sufficient and manage unforeseen crises. Her dog, Kia, comforts her during difficult times. Together, they cope with disastrous events and navigate dangerous territories. The narrator vividly describes the idyllic locations and people she encounters on her trip. Though it’s clear this adventure is important to Bukruian, she provides so little back story about her pre-sailing life that it’s difficult to understand its significance. What, besides her mother’s death, compels her to take this risk? Despite the memoir’s subtitle, it doesn’t feel like a love story. Bukruian’s relationship with Ed remains ambiguous throughout the majority of the book. This ambiguity could have been an opportunity to build tension, but instead the relationship is simply perplexing. A few arbitrary jumps in time disrupt plot development, and tedious sailing details and wooden dialogue sometimes drain interest. A few typos and misspellings are also distracting. While Bukruian takes the reader along for a high-seas adventure, the reflection that’s necessary to contextualize how this changed her is scant. It’s apparent that the narrator is a strong woman by the actions she takes, but her inner state isn’t dramatized on the page.
An adventure story with an engaging plot but underdeveloped craft.Pub Date: May 24, 2012
ISBN: 978-1468195897
Page Count: 288
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 2, 2012
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
