Even with its flaws, this effort slightly outpaces the first, edging marginally closer to believability.
Fourteen-year-old Helicity, survivor of both a tornado and a flash flood in her eponymous first outing (2018), is back for more encounters with stormy weather.
This time, she’s spending summer vacation at a bed-and-breakfast on the Gulf of Mexico, but not before a frighteningly turbulent flight from her home in Michigan. Unexpectedly, Helicity’s crush, fellow weather fan Sam, arrives with her brother, Andy, who has secretly become addicted to pain killers after his serious injuries during the tornado. Now Andy is hanging around with a sketchy dude, and they may be responsible for a series of break-ins. Meanwhile, Helicity falls for hunky Trey, then endures a sequence of strong thunderstorms with him—and Sam. Naturally, a major hurricane is also on the way. In an effort to locate missing Andy, Helicity ultimately finds shelter in an abandoned lighthouse as the hurricane barrels ashore. Dealing with her conflicted romantic feelings—Sam or Trey?—she moves from one weather-related cliffhanger to another as Zee sometimes interrupts the action to offer brief explanations of these weather events. These are too little to satisfy those who might choose this effort for an immersive meteorology experience rather than hackneyed melodrama. The cast of predictable characters are nearly all white except, perhaps, Trey, who has a Spanish surname.
Even with its flaws, this effort slightly outpaces the first, edging marginally closer to believability. (Adventure. 10-14)Pub Date: April 23, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-368-00217-2
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: March 2, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel.
Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment.
Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty. To start, in an alternate ending to the previous episode, Principal Krupp ends up in prison (“…a lot like being a student at Jerome Horwitz Elementary School, except that the prison had better funding”). There, he witnesses fellow inmate Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) escape in a giant Robo-Suit (later reduced to time-traveling trousers). The villain sets off after George and Harold, who are in juvie (“not much different from our old school…except that they have library books here.”). Cut to five years previous, in a prequel to the whole series. George and Harold link up in kindergarten to reduce a quartet of vicious bullies to giggling insanity with a relentless series of pranks involving shaving cream, spiders, effeminate spoof text messages and friendship bracelets. Pilkey tucks both topical jokes and bathroom humor into the cartoon art, and ups the narrative’s lexical ante with terms like “pharmaceuticals” and “theatrical flair.” Unfortunately, the bullies’ sad fates force Krupp to resign, so he’s not around to save the Earth from being destroyed later on by Talking Toilets and other invaders…
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-545-17534-0
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: June 19, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2012
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish.
The dreary prospect of spending a lifetime making caskets instead of wonderful inventions prompts a young orphan to snatch up his little sister and flee. Where? To the circus, of course.
Fortunately or otherwise, John and 6-year-old Page join up with Boz—sometime human cannonball for the seedy Wandering Wayfarers and a “vertically challenged” trickster with a fantastic gift for sowing chaos. Alas, the budding engineer barely has time to settle in to begin work on an experimental circus wagon powered by chicken poop and dubbed (with questionable forethought) the Autopsy. The hot pursuit of malign and indomitable Great-Aunt Beauregard, the Coggins’ only living relative, forces all three to leave the troupe for further flights and misadventures. Teele spins her adventure around a sturdy protagonist whose love for his little sister is matched only by his fierce desire for something better in life for them both and tucks in an outstanding supporting cast featuring several notably strong-minded, independent women (Page, whose glare “would kill spiders dead,” not least among them). Better yet, in Boz she has created a scene-stealing force of nature, a free spirit who’s never happier than when he’s stirring up mischief. A climactic clutch culminating in a magnificently destructive display of fireworks leaves the Coggin sibs well-positioned for bright futures. (Illustrations not seen.)
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish. (Adventure. 11-13)Pub Date: April 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234510-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Walden Pond Press/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
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