Vail captures the complexity of middle school social challenges, insightfully addressing the issues of friendships and...
Eighth-grader Truly’s foray into popularity spirals into a tempest of deceit and betrayal.
Upon turning 13, Truly is given a measure of technological freedom: a cellphone and access to social media. But this soon evolves into a quagmire of problems for Truly. When former BFF Natasha invites her to join the Popular Table during lunchtime and to collaborate on a school assignment, Truly is surprised but thrilled. However, Natasha’s overtures hide an ulterior motive. In the pursuit of popularity, Truly neglects her friendship with Hazel, who retaliates by plotting revenge utilizing social media. The Truly/Hazel dynamic is just one component of this interwoven story. Vail explores the motivations and private quandaries of the six characters who narrate the tale, from Jack, the quiet advocate for those excluded, to the socially conscious and manipulative Natasha, who yearns to be the most popular. With keen insight, Vail reveals the internal struggles with uncertainty and self-doubt that can plague young teens regardless of popularity status. Natasha’s schemes and Hazel’s misdeeds lead to a relentless barrage of bullying via social media for Truly. While a dramatic moment reveals the extent of Truly’s anguish, Vail concludes the tale with a resolution that is both realistic and hopeful.
Vail captures the complexity of middle school social challenges, insightfully addressing the issues of friendships and integrity. (Fiction. 12-15)Pub Date: Sept. 25, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-670-01307-4
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: July 28, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Rushed but lush, with a nice touch of Victorian post-humanism for an original twist
The prize for saving the world is having to do it all over again in this companion to the steampunk romance The Unnaturalists (2012).
Syrus, Vespa, Olivia and Bayne are trying to rebuild their empire after destroying the Creeping Waste. Empress Olivia rules her fractured people of humans and Elementals from a ramshackle warehouse, while her devoted admirer, the Tinker Syrus, tries unsuccessfully to repair it. The magic users Bayne and Vespa try to help, even as they dance around their own romantic tensions. New villains threaten the fragile peace. From within, they’re challenged by Bayne’s estranged, noble parents, who may well be ignoring Olivia’s edict and using myth distilled from murdered Elementals to power their engines. From without, an ancient and legendary evil threatens: Ximu, Queen of the Shadowspiders. In interleaved chapters told from Syrus’ present-tense, first-person perspective alternating with Vespa’s past-tense, third-person point of view, the adventure unfolds with jumpy pacing but luscious worldbuilding. Nineteenth-century science has become religion in this fairyland full of airships and clockwork beasties. There are clear missed opportunities here: “What in the name of Darwin and all his Apes” is the point of bringing in such a famous eccentric as Nikola Tesla—famous for a hatred of round objects and an obsession with the number three—if only to portray him just as a generic genius?
Rushed but lush, with a nice touch of Victorian post-humanism for an original twist . (Steampunk. 13-15)Pub Date: Feb. 11, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4424-5759-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Nov. 26, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
Aussie-flavored excitement with ancient Greek tidbits, underdeveloped in places.
Immortality, a sunken city, a violent Minotaur and a cult join in contemporary Australia for adventure that’s haphazard but fast-paced.
Sadie longs to leave Perth’s stultifying beach days for “Oxford. Melbourne. Anywhere.” Excitement comes when she witnesses an attack on an old man. She chases off the attackers, and before dying in the hospital, the stranger bequeaths her his house—then promptly returns in a teenage body. Jake’s an 8,000-year-old immortal envoy from the Gods. The attackers, who escaped into the sea, are Drowners with “soft-boiled eyes” and “bile-coloured lips,” doomed to rot in the ocean depths. Jake guards a power-wielding demon in a box, which the Drowners want for their ruler, who’s underwater in Atlantis; but if anyone uses the demon’s power, “the Gods will set the whole planet ablaze.” There’s gore and nonstop action as Sadie and Jake dash around town coping with Drowners, a murderer, a human-devouring Minotaur and evangelists craving blood sacrifice who think Jake’s their savior. Despite deft handling of Sadie’s grief over her parents’ deaths years ago, Bartlett neglects Jake’s crucial emotional back story: Supposedly, fear and shame prevented Jake from solving the demon/Gods crisis ages ago, but the text gives barely a nod to Jake’s emotions, so that explanation seems empty. Narrative perspective wanders; careless slams (“lezzo”; the Drowners “look…Japanese”) rankle.
Aussie-flavored excitement with ancient Greek tidbits, underdeveloped in places. (Fantasy. 12-15)Pub Date: Feb. 11, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-921922-74-9
Page Count: 308
Publisher: Text
Review Posted Online: Nov. 26, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2013
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