Though not as distinctive as its predecessor, this is a solid story for readers who want to approach ghosts without getting...
A girl seeks peace and stability for living and dead family members.
Sukie and her parents move into elderly cousin Hepzibah’s ancient, haunted mansion because they can’t afford to stay in their old house. Sukie’s deceased sister Kitty comes too, as a ghost. In life, Kitty’s job was protecting Sukie; in death, she continues. But ghosts can’t change, and they become frustrated when the living do. Kitty’s fury ramps up as Sukie tries to help another ghost and makes some living friends from the New-York Circulating Material Repository, the circulating collection of objects from The Grimm Legacy (2010) and The Wells Bequest (2013). One friend is Andre, who was a young child in the previous volumes. Unfortunately, here, Andre’s personality is vague and his physicality, othered—he’s the only black character and walks “like a panther,” with his height and long arms and legs mentioned incessantly. Copious literary references and a trip into the repository’s Poe Annex, a “separate dimension” of haunted houses from fictional texts, create texture, though the repository doesn’t sparkle as it did in The Wells Bequest. The coolest idea—that Sukie’s family, including her ghost-ancestor, may have descended from within fiction—is fabulous but underemphasized.
Though not as distinctive as its predecessor, this is a solid story for readers who want to approach ghosts without getting too spooked. (author’s note) (Fantasy. 10-13)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-399-16614-3
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Nancy Paulsen Books
Review Posted Online: June 9, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2015
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
A very promising kickoff with arbitrary but intriguingly challenging magic.
A middle schooler discovers both up and down sides to being able to foretell the future.
Members of the Cleary clan in alternating generations have always been granted predictive powers on their 4,444th day of life, and Celia has been eagerly looking forward to her first vision—until, that is, it comes and reveals that cute, quiet classmate Jeffrey is slated to die in a hit-and-run. Weighing her horror against her wise Grammy’s warnings that fate is inexorable, she contrives a way to head off the accident…only to foresee another fatal mishap in his future. And another. By the time she’s saved his life five times in a row, she’s not only exhausted, but crushing on the hapless lad. (As, unsurprisingly, he is on her.) Reintgen generally keeps the tone of his series opener light, so even after Celia discovers that there’s ultimately a tragic price for her intervention, the ensuing funeral service is marked by as much laughter as sorrow. The author surrounds his frantic but good-hearted protagonist with a particularly sturdy supporting cast that includes gratifyingly cooperative friends as well as her Grammy and loving, if nonmagical, mom. There don’t seem to be many Cleary men around; perhaps that and certain other curious elements, like a chart listing particular Cleary specialties with names such as Dreamwalker and Grimdark, will be addressed in future entries. Main characters read as White.
A very promising kickoff with arbitrary but intriguingly challenging magic. (Fantasy. 10-13)Pub Date: May 31, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-66590-357-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2022
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