If this is the future, count child fans in.
Crepuscular carnivores! Hypnotized egrets! Amputated bottoms! The pajama-clad child pirate Mabel Jones is back for her latest adventure.
Though just a child, Mabel has dealt with magic before (The Unlikely Adventures of Mabel Jones, 2015). She’s nevertheless surprised when vines make off with her baby sister, Maggie. Following their trail, Mabel plunges through time into a future Earth where humans have disappeared and animals reign supreme. To recover her sister, Mabel must pair once again with fellow “hooman snuglet” Jarvis and veteran goat pirate Pelf. The journey to the titular Forbidden City (read: NYC) where Maggie is held means pairing too with the adventurers Speke, a jolly otter with all the acumen of a Bertie Wooster, and Carruthers, a pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps badger. Naturally, the waterways are thick with peril. Naturally, they must face a baddie of towering nastiness. And naturally, it will take a great deal of sacrifice on Mabel’s part to reach a happy ending. As with the first novel, the narrator who haunts this book’s pages isn’t just intrusive. It’s likely to sit on your lap and make snide comments about the nits in your hair. The result is wordplay that dances and teases, making every page an act of high entertainment. With this sequel, the humor is higher and the gross-out jokes less frequent than in the opener, and the adventure is pleasingly heart-pounding.
If this is the future, count child fans in. (Adventure. 8-11)Pub Date: Feb. 9, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-451-47197-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2015
“It’s impossible! It’s unnatural! It’s weird!” exclaims Suki. Readers will echo Danny’s response: “Good enough for me!”...
Tasked with driving a fearsome Dream Wasp away from Wendell, their nerdy reptilian buddy, Danny Dragonbreath and Suki the salamander crawl into his sleeping brain. Eeeww.
So exhausted from lack of rest that he gets an A- on a test and reluctant to seek help from his New-Age mother (“No, Mom, not the kelp!”), Wendell turns in desperation to Danny’s wise if mythological great-grandfather Dragonbreath for advice. Thus it is that Danny and Suki, with a “baku” (dream eater) in tow, are soon on their way. They stumble through dream chambers stuffed with mounds of unappetizing health food, run from monstrous school bullies and search zillions of books (Reasons That I Will Die of Shame if Suki Ever Finds Out I Like Her) on the way to climactically vanquishing the giant Wasp (eek) and smashing her slime-filled eggs (yuck). As in episodes past, Vernon tells the tale in a running mix of prose and green-highlighted drawings with dialogue balloons, slides in wisecracks galore and closes with a teaser for the next chapter (something involving “mutant thieves”).
“It’s impossible! It’s unnatural! It’s weird!” exclaims Suki. Readers will echo Danny’s response: “Good enough for me!” (Graphic hybrid fantasy. 8-11)Pub Date: Jan. 29, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-8037-3846-1
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 30, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2012
A lightweight, spooky adventure with an unusually exotic cast.
A trio of whirling weasel assassin spirits with Freddy Krueger–style claws ambush a Japanese-British child on an abandoned farm. Whoo-hoo!
Having dealt with a monster with a detachable head in the opening episode (Takeshita Demons, 2010), Miku is alert to the presence of other Japanese spirits who have followed her transplanted family overseas. These turn out to be dismayingly common, as a school camping trip becomes a nonstop series of encounters with supernatural creatures. These range from the comical one of the title—an “aka-na-me,” who delights in cleaning bathrooms and like places with its tongue (“Disgusting, but useful,” Miku notes)—to a malign shape-shifting fox who first orchestrates a campfire storytelling rite (Hyaku Monogatari) to create a nest of Sickle Weasels (kama itachi) then leads Miku into their midst. Salting her tale not only with Japanese folklore, but sickening odors, an abrupt power failure, classmates behaving oddly and other suspense-building elements, Burne sets up an exciting if clumsily choreographed extended battle. In it, Miku, with unexpected help from eldritch allies, vanquishes her attackers while ending up covered in soot and slime (she avoids being licked clean, but a classmate is not so lucky).
A lightweight, spooky adventure with an unusually exotic cast. (Light horror. 9-11)Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-84780-136-4
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Frances Lincoln
Review Posted Online: Sept. 25, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
