For those who might enjoy a dog book, a science book, or just a good story.
Lucy must be a very intelligent girl, since she is able to build a rocket capable of traveling nearly the speed of light from stray parts—that then accidentally launches her hapless basset hound, Laika, into space.
From that point, the tale alternates between Laika’s strange adventures and Lucy’s not especially commonplace life, as the white, science-focused girl learns to manage her grief over her lost dog and grows into a very clever astrophysicist. She’s so clever that she wins the Nobel Prize for physics. Laika’s adventures simply increase in strangeness, as she’s rescued by doglike extraterrestrials in a bone-shaped spacecraft that passes through a wormhole on its way to Alpha Centauri. For Laika, time spins rapidly past. For Lucy, a lifetime goes by before they are miraculously reunited. The tale is told in often repetitive language that’s reminiscent of Roald Dahl’s style, with most sentences unvarying in structure. This somehow imparts a sense of fable rather than mere story, but this style has the potential to grow tedious and annoying. Saving it from tedium are Laika’s delicious doggy enthusiasm, Arnaldo’s evocative illustrations, the lovely, simple explanation of difficult concepts of space and time, and, of course, a very happy ending.
For those who might enjoy a dog book, a science book, or just a good story. (Science fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Aug. 15, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-55432-2
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2017
An impressive sequel.
Boy and fox follow separate paths in postwar rebuilding.
A year after Peter finds refuge with former soldier Vola, he prepares to leave to return to his childhood home. He plans to join the Junior Water Warriors, young people repurposing the machines and structures of war to reclaim reservoirs and rivers poisoned in the conflict, and then to set out on his own to live apart from others. At 13, Peter is competent and self-contained. Vola marvels at the construction of the floor of the cabin he’s built on her land, but the losses he’s sustained have left a mark. He imposes a penance on himself, reimagining the story of rescuing the orphaned kit Pax as one in which he follows his father’s counsel to kill the animal before he could form a connection. He thinks of his heart as having a stone inside it. Pax, meanwhile, has fathered three kits who claim his attention and devotion. Alternating chapters from the fox’s point of view demonstrate Pax’s care for his family—his mate, Bristle; her brother; and the three kits. Pax becomes especially attached to his daughter, who accompanies him on a journey that intersects with Peter’s and allows Peter to not only redeem his past, but imagine a future. This is a deftly nuanced look at the fragility and strength of the human heart. All the human characters read as White. Illustrations not seen.
An impressive sequel. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Sept. 7, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-06-293034-7
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Balzer + Bray/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2021
Ultimately more than a little full of itself, but well-stocked with big themes, inventively spun fairy-tale tropes, and...
Good has won every fairy-tale contest with Evil for centuries, but a dark sorcerer’s scheme to turn the tables comes to fruition in this ponderous closer.
Broadening conflict swirls around frenemies Agatha and Sophie as the latter joins rejuvenated School Master Rafal, who has dispatched an army of villains from Capt. Hook to various evil stepmothers to take stabs (literally) at changing the ends of their stories. Meanwhile, amid a general slaughter of dwarves and billy goats, Agatha and her rigid but educable true love, Tedros, flee for protection to the League of Thirteen. This turns out to be a company of geriatric versions of characters, from Hansel and Gretel (in wheelchairs) to fat and shrewish Cinderella, led by an enigmatic Merlin. As the tale moves slowly toward climactic battles and choices, Chainani further lightens the load by stuffing it with memes ranging from a magic ring that must be destroyed and a “maleficent” gown for Sophie to this oddly familiar line: “Of all the tales in all the kingdoms in all the Woods, you had to walk into mine.” Rafal’s plan turns out to be an attempt to prove that love can be twisted into an instrument of Evil. Though the proposition eventually founders on the twin rocks of true friendship and family ties, talk of “balance” in the aftermath at least promises to give Evil a fighting chance in future fairy tales. Bruno’s polished vignettes at each chapter’s head and elsewhere add sophisticated visual notes.
Ultimately more than a little full of itself, but well-stocked with big themes, inventively spun fairy-tale tropes, and flashes of hilarity. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: July 21, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-210495-3
Page Count: 672
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 25, 2015
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