Light on plot, heavy on agenda, this sequel to The Sniper (1989) belabors readers with the author’s outrage over the illicit use of rare or exotic animals in “canned” hunts and Asian medicine. Taylor (Hello, Arctic, p. 1045, etc.) gets the ball rolling by plugging in elements from the previous tale. Once again, just as teenaged Ben Jepson’s high-profile animal-rights activist parents disappear while traveling in a remote corner of the world, and the foreman of their big-cat preserve in California is hospitalized leaving Ben in charge, the compound is attacked—this time by multiple enemies. First, Asian gangsters involved in tiger poaching drop the body of a young prostitute into the spotted leopards’ compound, then, after Ben takes time out from the ensuing investigation to blow the whistle on a ranch where discarded zoo animals are sold to would-be hunters, parties unknown contrive to whisk the preserve’s huge Siberian tiger away in the night. Breaking into italics, generally for no discernable reason, the author tells the tale tersely, hammering away at unscrupulous zoos and wild animal handlers in repetitive conversations or ruminations, and giving Ben a trail of convenient clues that lead, finally, to the kidnapped tiger, a second corpse, and an end from which strings dangle like carpet fringe. Taylor’s cause is a worthy one, but the perfunctory story onto which he loads it is a nonstarter. (Fiction. 11-13)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-439-33725-9
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Blue Sky/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2002
If it were a Golden Age comic, this tale of ridiculous science, space dogs and humanoid aliens with flashlights in their hands might not be bad. Alas... Number Four is a fugitive from the planet Lorien, which is sloppily described as both "hundreds of lightyears away" and "billions of miles away." Along with eight other children and their caretakers, Number Four escaped from the Mogadorian invasion of Lorien ten years ago. Now the nine children are scattered on Earth, hiding. Luckily and fairly nonsensically, the planet's Elders cast a charm on them so they could only be killed in numerical order, but children one through three are dead, and Number Four is next. Too bad he's finally gained a friend and a girlfriend and doesn't want to run. At least his newly developing alien powers means there will be screen-ready combat and explosions. Perhaps most idiotic, "author" Pittacus Lore is a character in this fiction—but the first-person narrator is someone else entirely. Maybe this is a natural extension of lightly hidden actual author James Frey's drive to fictionalize his life, but literature it ain't. (Science fiction. 11-13)
Pub Date: Aug. 17, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-06-196955-3
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2010
Paulsen recalls personal experiences that he incorporated into Hatchet (1987) and its three sequels, from savage attacks by moose and mosquitoes to watching helplessly as a heart-attack victim dies. As usual, his real adventures are every bit as vivid and hair-raising as those in his fiction, and he relates them with relish—discoursing on “The Fine Art of Wilderness Nutrition,” for instance: “Something that you would never consider eating, something completely repulsive and ugly and disgusting, something so gross it would make you vomit just looking at it, becomes absolutely delicious if you’re starving.” Specific examples follow, to prove that he knows whereof he writes. The author adds incidents from his Iditarod races, describes how he made, then learned to hunt with, bow and arrow, then closes with methods of cooking outdoors sans pots or pans. It’s a patchwork, but an entertaining one, and as likely to win him new fans as to answer questions from his old ones. (Autobiography. 10-13)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-385-32650-5
Page Count: 150
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2000
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