Mundane illustrations aside, this extended play on words is likely to spark both discussion and rumination.
A traveler finds many Ways to follow and to share before finding one of his own.
Setting out over autumnal fields that give way to urban and even nautical settings, a “really nice kid named Martin” finds one Way after another. He meets a friend who is stuck and in need of a “new Way” and another, who has a “different Way” and invites him along to explore. As he finds more Ways, Martin comes to realize that each is unique, that all are good, that there is no right Way or wrong Way. Ultimately he finds “the Way that was right for him.” Marshall really milks the metaphor, but there’s still a little juice left—particularly in the observation that the “right Way” for some is “no Way.” (In the accompanying picture, which is equally ambiguous, Martin stands on a precipice gazing into the starry cosmos.) Broadly inclusive as Marshall’s philosophy may be, Bukiert gives it a parochial cast by depicting Martin and the people he meets as mostly light of skin and western European in dress and features. Adding visual appeal but not much depth to the central conceit, the illustrations depict the Ways as abstract ribbons that loop through each scene and can be walked on, followed, or picked up and carried along.
Mundane illustrations aside, this extended play on words is likely to spark both discussion and rumination. (Picture book. 10-13)Pub Date: Oct. 18, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4867-0944-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Flowerpot Press
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2016
In this series debut, Maggie Sinclair tracks down a dognapper and solves a mystery about the noises in the walls of her Brooklyn brownstone apartment building. The 12-year-old heroine, who shares a middle name—Brooklyn—with her twin brother, Finn, is juggling two dogwalking jobs she’s keeping secret from her parents, and somehow she attracts the ire of the dogs’ former walker. Maggie tells her story in the first person—she’s self-possessed and likable, even when her clueless brother invites her ex–best friend, now something of an enemy, to their shared 12th birthday party. Maggie’s attention to details helps her to figure out why dogs seem to be disappearing and why there seem to be mice in the walls of her building, though astute readers will pick up on the solution to at least one mystery before Maggie solves it. There’s a brief nod to Nancy Drew, but the real tensions in this contemporary preteen story are more about friendship and boy crushes than skullduggery. Still, the setting is appealing, and Maggie is a smart and competent heroine whose personal life is just as interesting as—if not more than—her detective work. (Mystery. 10-13)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2010
ISBN: 967-1-59990-525-9
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: Sept. 15, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2010
Writing as authority “Miss Edythe McFate,” Blume reveals that, even in New York, fairy folk are all around—having adapted to the urban environment—and so city children had best take special care not to run afoul of them. In two-dozen short chapters she introduces many types, explains their powers and (usually mischievous) proclivities and dispels common superstitions. She also suggests doable practices and strategies to stay on their good sides, such as leaving dishes of warm water, flower petals and Gummi bears around the house and ushering inchworms and ladybugs (all of which are fairy pets) found indoors back outside rather than killing them. Along with frequent weedy borders and corner spots, Foote adds portraits of chubby or insectile creatures, often in baroque attire. Interspersed with eight original tales (of children rescuing brownies ejected from the Algonquin Hotel during renovations, discovering a magical farm behind a door in the Lincoln Tunnel and so on), this collection of lore (much of it newly minted) offers an entertaining change of pace from the more traditional likes of Susannah Marriott’s Field Guide to Fairies (2009). (Informational fantasy. 10-13)
Pub Date: Sept. 14, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-375-86203-8
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: July 29, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2010
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