Fourteen-year-old Jack has built his own canoe, and on a hot August dawn, he sets off for her maiden voyage in his beloved Okefenokee Swamp. Jack’s a lot like Sam of the author’s My Side of the Mountain (1959): at home in his environment and able to fend for himself. He intends to stay for only a little while, but is drawn into an adventure that changes his life. The first three days are idyllic, and George brings the swamp to life with sweeping descriptions of the waters, birds, and plants of the region. Then Jack discovers he can’t get back to his home because of a blockage on the river. He spots an island and heads for it, but just as he begins to land, an alligator attacks the canoe, rips a great gash, and charges him. Nimbly, he pole-vaults with his paddle onto land and is able to drag the canoe to safety. With only a machete and a Leatherman knife, he sets out to create a campsite, build a tree house of sorts for sleeping, and figure a way to repair the canoe. An Airedale wanders in and, to his surprise, answers to his own dog’s name, Dizzy. A few days later, he returns to his campsite to find a boy who looks exactly like him. He has come, he says, for his dog. His voice has a soft Georgia twang to it, but, other than that, the two boys are identical. Jake Leed is adopted and asks Jack if he is too, but Jack vehemently denies it. In the next few days, along with multiple adventures, Jack faces the fact that he and Jake are identical twins. He’s never known he’s adopted and doesn’t want to confront his parents with his news, but Jake decides they will face both parents together. The ending is a pleasant and satisfying surprise. Though the story has many subplots, the star is the swamp itself, and this naturalist deftly keeps its life in focus as she weaves her tale. The ink sketches of flowers and scenery are an attractive addition. (Fiction. 10-12)
Pub Date: May 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-06-000254-9
Page Count: 256
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2002
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
Series fans, at least, will take this outing (and clear evidence of more to come) in stride.
Zipping back and forth in time atop outsized robo–bell bottoms, mad inventor Tippy Tinkletrousers (aka Professor Poopypants) legs his way to center stage in this slightly less-labored continuation of episode 9.
The action commences after a rambling recap and a warning not to laugh or smile on pain of being forced to read Sarah Plain and Tall. Pilkey first sends his peevish protagonist back a short while to save the Earth (destroyed in the previous episode), then on to various prehistoric eras in pursuit of George, Harold and the Captain. It’s all pretty much an excuse for many butt jokes, dashes of off-color humor (“Tippy pressed the button on his Freezy-Beam 4000, causing it to rise from the depths of his Robo-Pants”), a lengthy wordless comic and two tussles in “Flip-o-rama.” Still, the chase kicks off an ice age, the extinction of the dinosaurs and the Big Bang (here the Big “Ka-Bloosh!”). It ends with a harrowing glimpse of what George and Harold would become if they decided to go straight. The author also chucks in a poopy-doo-doo song with musical notation (credited to Albert P. Einstein) and plenty of ink-and-wash cartoon illustrations to crank up the ongoing frenzy.
Series fans, at least, will take this outing (and clear evidence of more to come) in stride. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Jan. 15, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-545-17536-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2013
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