A thoroughly enjoyable and exceedingly intelligent novel.
In Cricket’s middle-grade novel, a young English boy is sent to live with the American father he’s never known and finds himself immersed in military intrigue.
After Kai Flynn’s mother dies, he’s raised by his Gran in London; when she checks herself into a “looney bin,” he has no choice but to decamp for the United States to live with his father, United States Air Force Sgt. Steven Flynn. They don’t exactly hit it off—Steven is imperiously authoritarian and all but immediately forces Kai to shear his unruly hair, and Kai is a peace-loving vegetarian, an incongruence comically captured by the author. However, they do bond over robotics; Steven builds them for the military, and Kai takes to constructing one of his own for a school project in a sweet homage to his “warrior dad.” Kai receives a package from someone named Fred—he doesn’t know anyone by that name—containing a USB flash drive that, when plugged into his computer, brings his rudimentary robot to vivid, talking life. Shortly after, Steven vanishes, and the scared boy is interrogated by the FBI and informed that Sgt. Flynn is AWOL. Joined by his friends Sandy and Carlos, Kai discovers that Fred is really “FRRED,” an acronym for Federal Rapid Response Electronic Defense, a semi-autonomous military weapon equipped with advanced machine-learning capabilities. The author here artfully combines a youthful adventure story (and a very funny one at that) with a tale of political malfeasance. Cricket deftly navigates familial drama and thrilling espionage beats as the youthful trio try to track down Kai’s father (who is, in essence, also FRRED’s dad). FRRED the robot is exuberantly unhinged, a machine tired of being reduced to his programming. (“I only want to be free to be me. Isn’t that what everyone wants?”) Young readers, and their parents, will delight in this lightsome but thoughtful yarn.
A thoroughly enjoyable and exceedingly intelligent novel.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2024
ISBN: 9798991155038
Page Count: 212
Publisher: Cosmic Turtle Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 12, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
This can’t be the last we ever hear of the Legendary Alston Boys of the purely surreal Logan County—imaginative,...
Can this really be the first time readers meet the Legendary Alston Boys of Logan County? Cousins and veteran sleuths Otto and Sheed Alston show us that we are the ones who are late to their greatness.
These two black boys are coming to terms with the end of their brave, heroic summer at Grandma’s, with a return to school just right around the corner. They’ve already got two keys to the city, but the rival Epic Ellisons—twin sisters Wiki and Leen—are steadily gaining celebrity across Logan County, Virginia, and have in hand their third key to the city. No way summer can end like this! These young people are powerful, courageous, experienced adventurers molded through their heroic commitment to discipline and deduction. They’ve got their shared, lifesaving maneuvers committed to memory (printed in a helpful appendix) and ready to save any day. Save the day they must, as a mysterious, bendy gentleman and an oversized, clingy platypus have been unleashed on the city of Fry, and all the residents and their belongings seem to be frozen in time and place. Will they be able to solve this one? With total mastery, Giles creates in Logan County an exuberant vortex of weirdness, where the commonplace sits cheek by jowl with the utterly fantastic, and populates it with memorable characters who more than live up to their setting.
This can’t be the last we ever hear of the Legendary Alston Boys of the purely surreal Logan County—imaginative, thrill-seeking readers, this is a series to look out for. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: April 2, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-328-46083-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Versify/HMH
Review Posted Online: Jan. 14, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2019
PERSPECTIVES
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