Never one to let a fancy go untickled, the pseudonymous author of The Anybodies (2004) and The Nobodies (2005) adds to the veritable spate of recent tales set in a subterranean New York. Here, after yet more fulminations against her—oh, sorry: “his”—creative writing teacher, Bode pits young heroine Fern against the megalomaniac Blue Queen. Said Queen has not only found a way to suck the souls from books and (really the same thing) people, but thanks to unusual skill as a de-motivational speaker, plots to conquer both the lower and upper cities with an “Embrace Your Inner Mediocrity” campaign. As ever, readers will have to stay alert to pick up the plethora of literary references, as Fern flies about in a glass elevator, steps out of a snowy, fur-lined wardrobe, turns her nerdy but game sidekick Howard into a pig (OK, a piggy bank, but the same idea) and more. All of this is on the way to demonstrating that nobility of spirit and right beliefs will ever win out over selfishness. The whiny personal comments will likely be wasted on children, but the series remains a delight for better-read audiences. (Fantasy. 10-12)
Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-06-079111-X
Page Count: 288
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2006
Amanda K. Woods, 12, is a girl to like’she just doesn’t know it yet. She’s quirky, serious, impulsive, imaginative, perceptive, smart, and now, sharp, thanks to the addition of the K that stands like a sword flashing confidently in the middle of her name. In an opening scene, Amanda says good-bye to Lyle Leveridge, former neighbor and friend who leaves behind, at her suggestion, the legacy of his right hand, which she “exchanges” with her own in a tingling, did-it-really-happen episode. That hand seems to give her special powers when it comes to baking muffins to her mother’s specifications, writing letters to a French pen pal, seeking the advice of a yogi, and more, in Rome, Wisconsin, circa 1950. Casting aside her mother’s meticulous criterion, older sister Margaret’s Dale Carnegie—inspired thoughts, and the dubious punditry of women’s magazines, Amanda learns to see through her own eyes, speak “her own real thoughts.” Cameron (More Stories Huey Tells, 1997, etc.) avoids grand revelations in favor of singular insights that affirm girlhood without self-consciousness. As Amanda moves from alone to alive, she becomes strong, but not impossibly so, realizing that her special powers are those inside her, not borrowed from the Lone Ranger or a boy’s hand. Amanda is the story, and she’s as funny as she is wise. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: April 21, 1998
ISBN: 0-374-36702-7
Page Count: 201
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 1998
The healing of a wounded child is at the center of this story, whose color and energy come primarily from the Hawaiian setting. Maile lives with her grandmother, Tutu Lady. Her mother, honored by a photograph in a local hotel, was a Hawaiian dancer who died saving others from a tidal wave. Her father has gone to the mainland to work (and to remarry), and her brother is in the Army. Maile, feeling alone and cut off, has two years of her father’s letters to her, unopened. Tutu Lady has suggested the ho’oponopono—the forgiveness that begins healing—but Maile will not speak of her father or her mother. The arrival of Brooke, a girl about Maile’s age who is recovering from cancer, begins to melt Maile’s resolve; she decides to search out a kahuna—healer—for Brooke. Descriptions of the islands’ lushness, a smattering of Hawaiian and pidgin, casual accounts of the making of poi and the capture of a pet pig, and the role of the mangoes of the title create a pretty ambiance, one that may carry readers through even when the story proves pat and predictable: Maile goes from a state of withdrawn misery to one of open forgiveness in a series of easy steps. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1998
ISBN: 0-380-97613-7
Page Count: 116
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 1998
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