Already feeling responsible for her father’s recent death, 14-year-old Amy takes a babysitting job for wealthy Mrs. Edgerton, and right off the bat she and her three-year-old charge Kendra are kidnapped. Taken to an abandoned cabin by two bumbling, small-time criminals, the girls are offered for ransom, but instead of sending notes, the kidnappers videotape the girls and send DVDs to the parents. However, Amy has the wherewithal to send coded messages in the tapes, and part of readers’ enjoyment is watching the filming and seeing if the parents can decode the messages. Kehret uses a third-person voice, allowing readers to follow the well-orchestrated actions of the various characters—kidnappers, hostages, parents, detectives, the nanny and other players who don’t even realize they are players. The story is fast-paced, plot-driven and involving, with comic relief provided by the captors’ fumbling machinations and little Kendra’s behavior. A sure hit for the intended audience. (Thriller. 9-11)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-525-47835-5
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2008
An orphaned child raised by pirates makes an uncommonly memorable lead in this British-style farce. Taught by her rough-and-tumble shipmates, eight-year-old Violet spits out the bugs she finds in her biscuits with an oath, expertly ties knots, goes to bed when she feels like it, and hardly ever bothers with a bath. She knows nothing about trees or flowers, but everything about wind and sea life. She can also swing about the rigging like a monkey—a talent that comes in handy when the Pirate Captain, who can’t stand the sight of, can’t even say the word b . . . bl . . . blood, sustains a minor wound that puts him off pirating altogether. Hamilton artfully implies violence without showing much, and Hearn’s cartoon line drawings reinforce the light tone. Forced to find a way to make money rather than take it, the pirates ultimately convert their ship to a floating Big Top, and come to realize that Violet is their real treasure. Delighted readers will have realized that long since. (Fiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: June 1, 2003
ISBN: 1-58234-848-0
Page Count: 126
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2003
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
After their successful sleuthing in Snatched (2006), Brian Bain and Roni Delicata are ready to solve more mysteries in their little town of Bloodwater. Fred Bloodwater, a real-estate developer, is planning on building condominiums on Indian Bluff, but Brian and Roni believe a local professor’s assertion that there are important Native American remains in caves on the bluff. When the professor is beaten and left unconscious, the intrepid detectives are on the case. Who was responsible for the assault? The professor’s ex-fiancée? Fred Bloodwater’s cute (but stupid) teenage son? A skunk-cabbage-obsessed botanist? Moreover, Brian is sure he has seen the Native American remains, in the form of a now-missing skull the professor called “Yorick.” This occasionally uneasy merger of realism and a more over-the-top Scooby Doo/Indiana Jones–style adventure can be jarring. Nevertheless, the adventures of these meddlesome junior sleuths, with the mystery’s tension cut by gentle humor, are quite entertaining. (Fiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: May 10, 2007
ISBN: 978-0-399-24378-3
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Sleuth/Putnam
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2007
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