An enjoyable and well-told story of magic and mystery.
A boy seeks to unlock the secrets of the cursed town of Davenport in this debut middle-grade novel.
When his widowed mother takes a job in a new town, 11-year-old Wyatt Dumont doesn’t mind moving. At least it will get him away from the local bully. Wyatt’s older sister, Roxanne, a moody goth teenager, isn’t as thrilled to leave her friends behind. And there is more that their mom isn’t telling them: “If we move there,” Roxy tells Wyatt, “she has to sign a contract for a year, and none of us can leave, not even for vacation.” Wyatt’s mom refuses to explain. Once the family drives through the dark forest that isolates the town of Davenport, the trio is let through a strange iron gate by a masked figure. Wyatt can’t help but wonder what is going on, but he starts to agree with his sister that moving was a mistake when he spots a 10-legged spider creeping through his new room. Shortly after, he finds out that the town is cursed and has been in unbroken night for the last 400 years. From there the mystery only deepens as Wyatt meets the peculiar denizens of Davenport and learns the source of the curse and discovers an ancient artifact. While finding new friends at school (and a new bully to deal with as well), Wyatt begins to understand that something strange—stranger than usual, anyway—is happening in Davenport. Vaughn has filled the world of the novel with fascinatingly unique creatures (“Wyatt looked into the darkness to see a smiling man with green skin and broad, finlike ears”). The author has tied them together in a twisted plot that should compel readers to keep turning pages to find the answers to the many enigmas of Davenport. What happened to the town and its people, what are they afraid of beyond the gate, and what role will Wyatt and his friends play? Most of all, what exactly is the Midnight Glass, and will it be the town’s salvation or its doom?
An enjoyable and well-told story of magic and mystery.Pub Date: Sept. 20, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-9963653-0-7
Page Count: 243
Publisher: Branford Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 23, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2017
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The seemingly ageless Seeger brings back his renowned giant for another go in a tuneful tale that, like the art, is a bit sketchy, but chockful of worthy messages. Faced with yearly floods and droughts since they’ve cut down all their trees, the townsfolk decide to build a dam—but the project is stymied by a boulder that is too huge to move. Call on Abiyoyo, suggests the granddaughter of the man with the magic wand, then just “Zoop Zoop” him away again. But the rock that Abiyoyo obligingly flings aside smashes the wand. How to avoid Abiyoyo’s destruction now? Sing the monster to sleep, then make it a peaceful, tree-planting member of the community, of course. Seeger sums it up in a postscript: “every community must learn to manage its giants.” Hays, who illustrated the original (1986), creates colorful, if unfinished-looking, scenes featuring a notably multicultural human cast and a towering Cubist fantasy of a giant. The song, based on a Xhosa lullaby, still has that hard-to-resist sing-along potential, and the themes of waging peace, collective action, and the benefits of sound ecological practices are presented in ways that children will both appreciate and enjoy. (Picture book. 5-9)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-83271-0
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2001
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