Brisk, bold, and buoyant.
The Penfurzy Rebel Bicycle Club saves not only the island, but maybe the whole world in this third video game–inspired episode following Rebel Bicycle Club (2023).
The club—which includes friends Demelza and Nessa, Captain Honkers the goose, and Mr. Calenick, a pickled medieval knight with a detachable head—gains a new member when Jack arrives on the island (established in previous entries as being in Cornwall) with his white dad and Haitian mom as part of a traveling carnival with several secrets and a rusty old bicycle in serious need of proper tricking out. One of the secrets, it turns out, is that Jack is a descendant of a certain legendary Jack from folklore, and another is that there are giants in caverns below Penfurzy, rendered harmless (for now) by a sleeping spell that is in desperate need of being renewed if they are not to rise and wreak havoc. Can the club members, wielding foam swords and riding wheeled steeds with names like Neon Justice II and Rogue Avenger, find a way into the giants’ cavern before they wake up? Created in conjunction with the Knights and Bikes video game, this volume features both blocky illustrations that reflect the game’s distinctive graphics and a pacey plotline festooned with obstacles, sudden reversals of fortune, magical helpers, daring exploits, and comical banter.
Brisk, bold, and buoyant. (map) (Fantasy adventure. 8-10)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2023
ISBN: 9781728237343
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Sourcebooks Young Readers
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Dizzyingly silly.
The famous superhero returns to fight another villain with all the trademark wit and humor the series is known for.
Despite the title, Captain Underpants is bizarrely absent from most of this adventure. His school-age companions, George and Harold, maintain most of the spotlight. The creative chums fool around with time travel and several wacky inventions before coming upon the evil Turbo Toilet 2000, making its return for vengeance after sitting out a few of the previous books. When the good Captain shows up to save the day, he brings with him dynamic action and wordplay that meet the series’ standards. The Captain Underpants saga maintains its charm even into this, the 11th volume. The epic is filled to the brim with sight gags, toilet humor, flip-o-ramas and anarchic glee. Holding all this nonsense together is the author’s good-natured sense of harmless fun. The humor is never gross or over-the-top, just loud and innocuous. Adults may roll their eyes here and there, but youngsters will eat this up just as quickly as they devoured every other Underpants episode.
Dizzyingly silly. (Humor. 8-10)Pub Date: Aug. 26, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-545-50490-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A dramatic, educational, authentic whale of a tale.
After a tsunami devastates their habitat in the Salish Sea, a young orca and her brother embark on a remarkable adventure.
Vega’s matriarchal family expects her to become a hunter and wayfinder, with her younger brother, Deneb, protecting and supporting her. Invited to guide her family to their Gathering Place to hunt salmon, Vega’s underwater miscalculations endanger them all, and an embarrassed Vega questions whether she should be a wayfinder. When the baby sister she hoped would become her life companion is stillborn, a distraught Vega carries the baby away to a special resting place, shocking her grieving family. Dispatched to find his missing sister, Deneb locates Vega in the midst of a terrible tsunami. To escape the waters polluted by shattered boats, Vega leads Deneb into unfamiliar open sea. Alone and hungry, the young siblings encounter a spectacular giant whale and travel briefly with shark-hunting orcas. Trusting her instincts and gaining emotional strength from contemplating the vastness of the sky, Vega knows she must lead her brother home and help save her surviving family. In alternating first-person voices, Vega and Deneb tell their harrowing story, engaging young readers while educating them about the marine ecosystem. Realistic black-and-white illustrations enhance the maritime setting.
A dramatic, educational, authentic whale of a tale. (maps, wildlife facts, tribes of the Salish Sea watershed, environmental and geographical information, how to help orcas, author’s note, artist’s note, resources) (Animal fiction. 8-10)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-299592-6
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2020
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