ANOTHER NASTYBOOK

Again writing for short attention spans, Yourgrau clambers onto Lemony Snicket’s coattails with this circular, surreal tale of a lad who, inspired by a redundantly dubbed “manga comic,” stumbles off to the rescue after his shrewish mother is supposedly kidnapped by goblins. Frustrated by his family’s utter lack of interest in her plight, Rollo snatches up a hockey stick, stuffs his backpack with NuttiNutz Bars and gamely sets out in search of Fairyland. There he runs into such obstacles as a yodeling prison guard, a pair of eye-patched twin treasure hunters and snarky talking dentures, as well as experiencing frequent restarts as he repeatedly wakes up in bed to discover that all that had gone before was a NuttiNutz Bar-fueled dream. De Jesus inserts occasional pages of comics-style panels, as well as mucky blots or smears intended to give the pages a well-thumbed look that they are unlikely to pick up from actual readers. (Fantasy. 10-12)