Like a comedian repeating the same joke louder each time: at first funny, then annoying; finally, just sad.
Harry Potter meets Diary of a Wimpy Kid in an initially witty debut that ultimately collapses.
Seventh-grader Max Spencer isn’t athletic, clever, brave or particularly kind, and he sure isn’t popular. But he is the long-lost heir of the arch-sorcerer who created the Codex of Infinite Knowability, which only Max can read. Inaccessible in our magic-free dimension, the Codex’s powerful spells are coveted by the mages of other realms; to retrieve it, they enlist the most vicious flesh-devouring monster known: Princess the Destroyer, the eponymous bad unicorn. The setup cleverly skewers common fantasy tropes, and delightfully gruesome vignettes of mayhem add extra spice. Though wildly uneven, the gags fly so rapidly that some are bound to provoke snickers. Unfortunately, Max has been rendered as such a convincing loser that it’s hard to root for him as a hero; his friends are shallow clichés and offensive stereotypes, and the remaining characters are merely walking punch lines. Identifying target readers isn’t easy; the protagonists’ ages (and the proclivity for crude humor) suggest a middle school audience, who will be baffled by plot twists relying upon the mechanics of ’80s-style arcade and tabletop games (let alone by the Al Gore jokes). The clunky, stilted prose is littered with $20 vocabulary. And when the many rambling discursions eventually converge to a genuinely gripping climax, too many storylines are simply dropped, apparently forgotten.
Like a comedian repeating the same joke louder each time: at first funny, then annoying; finally, just sad. (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: April 16, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4424-5012-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Feb. 26, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
A thrilling first installment in an adventurous new series.
An orphaned street urchin is recruited into an elite school for thieves.
In an alternate world where France is the dominant world power, 13-year-old Tom Morgan has had to scrimp, starve, and steal on the streets of London to survive. Born into a workhouse, he doesn’t know anything about his father, while his mother may have been from North Africa. One thing he does know is the sort of cruelty that awaits the poor who are sent to the workhouse, and he’s determined not to go back. But when their camp is raided and his friends are captured by workhouse agents, the only thing Tom can think of is how to get them out. Enter the Corsair, a cunning and mysterious man with a proposition: He wants to recruit Tom into Beaufort’s School for Deceptive Arts. From nabbing treasures to forging identity papers, Beaufort’s promises to teach Tom everything he needs to know to become a Shadow Thief and a member of the Shadow League, the secret global organization that helps keep the world’s political power in balance. But Beaufort’s has its own rules and secrets, and if Tom is to survive long enough to help his friends, he’ll need to figure them out quickly. Clever and gripping, this fast-paced boarding school story will appeal to fans of the Mysterious Benedict Society and Spy School series.
A thrilling first installment in an adventurous new series. (Adventure. 10-14)Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2025
ISBN: 9781665982283
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2025
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel.
Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment.
Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. To start, in an alternate ending to the previous episode, Principal Krupp ends up in prison (“…a lot like being a student at Jerome Horwitz Elementary School, except that the prison had better funding”). There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). The villain sets off after George and Harold, who are in juvie (“not much different from our old school…except that they have library books here.”). Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. George and Harold link up in kindergarten to reduce a quartet of vicious bullies to giggling insanity with a relentless series of pranks involving shaving cream, spiders, effeminate spoof text messages and friendship bracelets. Pilkey tucks both topical jokes and bathroom humor into the cartoon art, and ups the narrative’s lexical ante with terms like “pharmaceuticals” and “theatrical flair.” Unfortunately, the bullies’ sad fates force Krupp to resign, so he’s not around to save the Earth from being destroyed later on by Talking Toilets and other invaders…
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-545-17534-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
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