Verne-ian fantasy and reversal of fortune à la Dickens will lure readers into this good-vs.-evil series debut.
Victorian-era adventure with a supernatural stock of magical and mythical players.
Grubb (“no first or last name”) was a doorstep drop-off adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Smears. With the death of compassionate Mrs. Smears, he is left in the care of Mr. Smears, a brutish chimney sweep. Grubb is forced to sweep chimneys for no pay while nasty Mr. Smears broods over beer. After a mishap involving soot and a horrid hotelier, Grubb hides in the trunk of a parting guest to avoid a beating. The guest is Alistair Grim, and when Grubb exits the trunk, he is in the titular Odditorium, a collective of “Odditoria” (among them a talking watch and a trickster banshee). Grubb is invited to work for Grim under the proviso that he won’t reveal magical secrets, but when he unwittingly breaks that cardinal rule, he attracts Grim’s nemesis. Battles, kidnapping and sorcery ensue. The series opener’s Anglophile charm is occasionally muddied with an abundance of character introductions. To navigate this bevy of names and species, there is a character list and glossary. Black-and-white illustrations somewhere between daguerreotype and manga supplement the vivid textual imagery. Grubb’s cheat-to-the-audience moments at either end of the story are frustrating, if widely spaced (“My apologies, but I’m afraid you’ll have to take my word”).
Verne-ian fantasy and reversal of fortune à la Dickens will lure readers into this good-vs.-evil series debut. (Fantasy. 10-13)Pub Date: Jan. 6, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4847-0006-8
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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