An engaging introduction to what’s sure to be a breezy fantasy series.
A boy chances upon a remarkable girl who’s also sometimes a bird in this opening installment of Butler’s chapter-book series.
Third grader Ben has trouble believing his new friend Olivia’s story about a “Bird Girl.” This “wild girl” lives in the state park and makes it her mission to free caged birds. But then Ben meets Bird Girl, sitting high in a tree with her black hair jutting out like spread wings. She doesn’t have a name—for now, she calls herself Benita. She mentions a club; its members include herself, Olivia, and two other school kids. They’re all young, as Benita is invisible to any human over the age of 9. While the members are oddly mum about the club’s “true purpose,” Ben does witness Benita transform into a crow. He also gets the chance to help Benita do what she does best when two recently liberated parakeets are recaptured and in need of rescue. Butler’s compact tale is one of discovery and wonderment—Ben has many things to ask after learning about Benita, who has to limit him to five questions at his first club meeting. His untiring inquisitiveness opens up a profound theme of identity—is Benita a girl who turns into a bird, or a bird who turns into a girl? Despite the book’s brevity, it has memorable personalities aplenty on offer: Olivia is reluctant to provide Ben with club details, one member worries about their upcoming dreaded 10th year, and parents write off Bird Girl tales as “dribble.” In lively prose, the author delivers such memorable images as Benita, in bird form, who “strutted across the steel pole like an Olympic gymnast.” Butler’s lightly shaded black-and-white illustrations are modest, though Benita and her distinctive hair always stand out. This book’s ending, perhaps unsurprisingly, sets up the next installment.
An engaging introduction to what’s sure to be a breezy fantasy series.Pub Date: Jan. 10, 2024
ISBN: 9780982034286
Page Count: 82
Publisher: Pinchey House Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 26, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Hugely entertaining, timely, and triumphant.
Robot Roz undertakes an unusual ocean journey to save her adopted island home in this third series entry.
When a poison tide flowing across the ocean threatens their island, Roz works with the resident creatures to ensure that they will have clean water, but the destruction of vegetation and crowding of habitats jeopardize everyone’s survival. Brown’s tale of environmental depredation and turmoil is by turns poignant, graceful, endearing, and inspiring, with his (mostly) gentle robot protagonist at its heart. Though Roz is different from the creatures she lives with or encounters—including her son, Brightbill the goose, and his new mate, Glimmerwing—she makes connections through her versatile communication abilities and her desire to understand and help others. When Roz accidentally discovers that the replacement body given to her by Dr. Molovo is waterproof, she sets out to seek help and discovers the human-engineered source of the toxic tide. Brown’s rich descriptions of undersea landscapes, entertaining conversations between Roz and wild creatures, and concise yet powerful explanations of the effect of the poison tide on the ecology of the island are superb. Simple, spare illustrations offer just enough glimpses of Roz and her surroundings to spark the imagination. The climactic confrontation pits oceangoing mammals, seabirds, fish, and even zooplankton against hardware and technology in a nicely choreographed battle. But it is Roz’s heroism and peacemaking that save the day.
Hugely entertaining, timely, and triumphant. (author’s note) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9780316669412
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 26, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
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
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