With the jacket and a frontispiece by Edward Gorey, Bellairs' seventh book—about Johnny Dixon and the ever-cranky Professor Roderick Childermass—features a British villain who conjures up dark forces to advance his plans to take over the world. Professor Childermass learns that his brother Peregrine is dead, and with this news comes a riddle with a definite doomsday cast. Further, simply by spending the summer at his brother's Maine estate, the professor can inherit ten million dollars. He takes on the task, accompanied by his two young friends Johnny and Fergie—but none of them lasts the summer. An evil visitor to the estate, Mr. Stallybrass, who has in his possession a chess set of dwarflike pieces, uses black magic to foil the inheritance. He nearly succeeds in putting the deep freeze on the professor, Dr. Coote (an expert on magic and the occult), Johnny, and Fergie. Only a serendipitous meeting with an old witch who collects keys saves them—and the world as well. Only die-hard fans, enchanted by the previous books, will find solace and entertainment here. Incredible lapses of logic (the professor arrives at idea after idea without the least clue for readers as to his motives or his thinking processes) are shortcuts to longwinded passages that rush over crucial details and events. Formerly riveting characterizations have become, in this book, stock types. Thanks to the professor and Johnny, it's not the end of the world—but perhaps it should be the end of this formulaic series.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1989
ISBN: 161756348X
Page Count: 114
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: April 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 1989
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A nice but not requisite purchase.
A retelling of the classic fairy tale in board-book format and with a Mexican setting.
Though simplified for a younger audience, the text still relates the well-known tale: mean-spirited stepmother, spoiled stepsisters, overworked Cinderella, fairy godmother, glass slipper, charming prince, and, of course, happily-ever-after. What gives this book its flavor is the artwork. Within its Mexican setting, the characters are olive-skinned and dark-haired. Cultural references abound, as when a messenger comes carrying a banner announcing a “FIESTA” in beautiful papel picado. Cinderella is the picture of beauty, with her hair up in ribbons and flowers and her typically Mexican many-layered white dress. The companion volume, Snow White, set in Japan and illustrated by Misa Saburi, follows the same format. The simplified text tells the story of the beautiful princess sent to the forest by her wicked stepmother to be “done away with,” the dwarves that take her in, and, eventually, the happily-ever-after ending. Here too, what gives the book its flavor is the artwork. The characters wear traditional clothing, and the dwarves’ house has the requisite shoji screens, tatami mats and cherry blossoms in the garden. The puzzling question is, why the board-book presentation? Though the text is simplified, it’s still beyond the board-book audience, and the illustrations deserve full-size books.
A nice but not requisite purchase. (Board book/fairy tale. 3-5)Pub Date: Sept. 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4814-7915-8
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 11, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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