This light tale is weighted down by mediocre storytelling and a convoluted plot.
Amirah restores birthday magic to the neighborhood.
Strange things are happening in Amirah’s neighborhood. She missed her friend’s birthday party because she didn’t receive the invitation. She discovers that her brother missed a friend’s birthday for the same reason. Then her magical book of birthday-cake recipes starts to fade in her hands, and when she visits the Magical Land of Birthdays in her dreams, it doesn’t feel right—the magic is missing. With some good advice from an elderly friend, Amirah knows she must trust her heart, which tells her to return to the Magical Land of Birthdays to figure out what is going on. Her B-Buds—birthday buddies who share her birthday—are hesitant, but they trust Amirah enough to follow her around as she picks up clues. She eventually solves the mystery with her own birthday magic and is crowned princess of the Magical Land of Birthdays. Amirah is a likable-enough protagonist with an enviable family and cloyingly adoring friends. Her obsession with birthdays to the exclusion of any other interests feels a bit hollow and unsatisfying. The mystery of fading books and disappearing invitations is enough to draw readers in, but the multiple trips to and from the Magical Land, both in dreams and while awake, feel disruptive enough to take readers out of the story. The multicultural cast includes children who are Mexican, Jamaican, and Japanese; Amirah’s name is Arabic.
This light tale is weighted down by mediocre storytelling and a convoluted plot. (Fantasy. 6-11)Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4197-4028-2
Page Count: 176
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Aug. 31, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
Good, solid fantasy fun.
Nine-year-old Brooklynite Jaxon meets a witch, becomes her apprentice, and protects baby dragons all in one eventful day.
As the story opens, Jaxon and his mom are being evicted. While Mama tries to secure a place to stay, she leaves him with Ma, the woman who raised her. Ma clearly doesn’t want Jaxon around, but it becomes apparent that’s at least partially due to a mysterious package she’s received. Jax soon discovers that Ma’s a witch, his mom used to be Ma’s apprentice (a mantle he takes up), and that Ma’s package contains…baby dragons! The dragons need to be taken to the magical realm, but a transport malfunction strands Ma while Jax is sent back to Brooklyn. Desperate to save Ma, Jax enlists the help of his friend Vikram, whose little sister, Kavita, tags along. Curious—or is it nosy?—Kavita discovers the dragons and does the worst: feeds them. This not only increases their size, but bonds them to her. Thankfully, Trub, Jax’s maternal grandfather, is a magic user and helps Jax find Ma and get the dragons to the magical realm, where (discerning readers won’t be surprised) they discover one dragon is missing….What a breath of fresh air: a chapter-book fantasy with an urban setting, an array of brown-skinned magic wielders, and a lovable black protagonist readers will root for and sympathize with. Geneva B’s black-and-white illustrations depict a cast of color and appear every few pages.
Good, solid fantasy fun. (Fantasy. 6-10)Pub Date: Oct. 23, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5247-7045-7
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
A close encounter of the best kind.
Left behind when the space bus departs, a child discovers that the moon isn’t as lifeless as it looks.
While the rest of the space-suited class follows the teacher like ducklings, one laggard carrying crayons and a sketchbook sits down to draw our home planet floating overhead, falls asleep, and wakes to see the bus zooming off. The bright yellow bus, the gaggle of playful field-trippers, and even the dull gray boulders strewn over the equally dull gray lunar surface have a rounded solidity suggestive of Plasticine models in Hare’s wordless but cinematic scenes…as do the rubbery, one-eyed, dull gray creatures (think: those stress-busting dolls with ears that pop out when squeezed) that emerge from the regolith. The mutual shock lasts but a moment before the lunarians eagerly grab the proffered crayons to brighten the bland gray setting with silly designs. The creatures dive into the dust when the bus swoops back down but pop up to exchange goodbye waves with the errant child, who turns out to be an olive-skinned kid with a mop of brown hair last seen drawing one of their new friends with the one crayon—gray, of course—left in the box. Body language is expressive enough in this debut outing to make a verbal narrative superfluous.
A close encounter of the best kind. (Picture book. 6-8)Pub Date: May 14, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-8234-4253-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Margaret Ferguson/Holiday House
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2019
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