A fast-paced and fact-laced tale framed in graphic panels puts a young orphan aboard a British frigate for a spot of blockade duty—climaxed by a brisk exchange with a French three-decker and the fiery destruction of an enemy shipyard. Rated “Boy, Third Class,”12-year-old Jack reports for duty with his lubberly head filled with heroic visions. Months of hard chores and gun drills later, he’s ready to measure up when the Defender sails into an ambush engineered by a turncoat crewmember. Though Weigel isn’t much for natural-sounding dialogue (“The Admiralty’s hoping to box up the Frenchies in their ports so they can’t mount an invasion of England,” explains an avuncular bosun) he fills the side margins on each page of his action-packed, realistically detailed cartoon scenes with pithy comments on naval argot and discipline, historical background, warfare, weapons and nautical lore. Though it may be a stretch for the episode’s likely audience to move on, as the author recommends at the end, to C.S. Forester and Patrick O’Brian, Jack’s adventures will leave readers in the proper tar-and-gunpowder frame of mind. (resource list) (Graphic fiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: May 1, 2010
ISBN: 978-0-399-25089-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: Jan. 24, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2010
It’s not the first time old Ben has paid our times a call, but it’s funny and free-spirited, with an informational load that...
Antics both instructive and embarrassing ensue after a mysterious package left on their doorstep brings a Founding Father into the lives of two modern children.
Summoned somehow by what looks for all the world like an old-time crystal radio set, Ben Franklin turns out to be an amiable sort. He is immediately taken in hand by 7-year-old Olive for a tour of modern wonders—early versions of which many, from electrical appliances in the kitchen to the Illinois town’s public library and fire department, he justly lays claim to inventing. Meanwhile big brother Nolan, 10, tags along, frantic to return him to his own era before either their divorced mom or snoopy classmate Tommy Tuttle sees him. Fleming, author of Ben Franklin’s Almanac (2003) (and also, not uncoincidentally considering the final scene of this outing, Our Eleanor, 2005), mixes history with humor as the great man dispenses aphorisms and reminiscences through diverse misadventures, all of which end well, before vanishing at last. Following a closing, sequel-cueing kicker (see above) she then separates facts from fancies in closing notes, with print and online leads to more of the former. To go with spot illustrations of the evidently all-white cast throughout the narrative, Fearing incorporates change-of-pace sets of sequential panels for Franklin’s biographical and scientific anecdotes. Final illustrations not seen.
It’s not the first time old Ben has paid our times a call, but it’s funny and free-spirited, with an informational load that adds flavor without weight. (Graphic/fantasy hybrid. 9-11)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-101-93406-7
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Schwartz & Wade/Random
Review Posted Online: May 9, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2017
Monty Python meets Captain Underpants in a prose/cartoon hybrid from Down Under featuring Sir Glame, a puffed-up, borderline psychopath in armor, and his sarcastic equine sidekick Bill. The plot, insofar as there is one, involves a hunt for the author of Saucy McRascal’s Book of Fun!, a collection of smarmy verse (quoted at length) deemed entirely unsuitable for young readers. In a mix of cartoon panels and paragraphs liberally strewn with line drawings, the questing duo encounter a host of adversaries along the way, from motherly rival Hero Mrs. Honeychurch and her feathered sidekick Sir Quacksalot, to a space-alien cooking-show host, a literally downsized giant, and an Evil Giant Killer Robot From Hell. By the end, the pernicious poet is unmasked, but the bickering between Sir Glame and Bill escalates into an all-out battle that leaves the town of Sausagopolis in ruins. Wright blithely brings dead characters back to life, frequently veers off into irrelevant side episodes, and ratchets up the sarcasm along with the violence: so what’s not to like/offend—particularly for young readers who consider the Captain’s outings so third grade? (Fiction. 9-11)
Pub Date: June 1, 2004
ISBN: 1-86508-785-8
Page Count: 180
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2004
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