In Great Britain, this first volume in a projected Arthurian trilogy was shortlisted for the Whitbread Award, the Guardian Children’s Book Prize, and won the Bronze medal, Smarties Prize. On the level of medieval fantasy, it works very well indeed. The 13-year-old Arthur of this tale lives in the year 1199, the time of Richard Coeur de Lion, at Caldicot, and someone named Merlin also lives within the castle grounds. Merlin has given Arthur a piece of obsidian in which Arthur scries glimpses of another history: of Uther and Gorlois, of Sir Kay and a sword, and of a boy who shares his name and his countenance. He does not know these stories, but he is obsessed with reading and writing, with being named a squire, and with why his older brother hates him so. Arthur is a most engaging companion and a plenitude of historical facts about life in 12th-century England is imparted, but not a whole lot happens. At the end of this doorstopper all we know is that Arthur is not who he seems, nor is Merlin, and that his quest is about to begin. One cannot help but compare it to T.H. White’s Once and Future King, and one might be far more inclined to put that in the hands of youngsters eager for legend. (Fiction. 11-15)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-439-26326-3
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Levine/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2001
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
From England’s Children’s Laureate, a searing WWI-era tale of a close extended family repeatedly struck by adversity and injustice. On vigil in the trenches, 17-year-old Thomas Peaceful looks back at a childhood marked by guilt over his father’s death, anger at the shabby treatment his strong-minded mother receives from the local squire and others—and deep devotion to her, to his brain-damaged brother Big Joe, and especially to his other older brother Charlie, whom he has followed into the army by lying about his age. Weaving telling incidents together, Morpurgo surrounds the Peacefuls with mean-spirited people at home, and devastating wartime experiences on the front, ultimately setting readers up for a final travesty following Charlie’s refusal of an order to abandon his badly wounded brother. Themes and small-town class issues here may find some resonance on this side of the pond, but the particular cultural and historical context will distance the story from American readers—particularly as the pace is deliberate, and the author’s hints about where it’s all heading are too rare and subtle to create much suspense. (Fiction. 11-13, adult)
Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-439-63648-5
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2004
Despite the stale fat-to-curvy pattern, compelling world building with a Southern European, pseudo-Christian feel,...
Adventure drags our heroine all over the map of fantasyland while giving her the opportunity to use her smarts.
Elisa—Princess Lucero-Elisa de Riqueza of Orovalle—has been chosen for Service since the day she was born, when a beam of holy light put a Godstone in her navel. She's a devout reader of holy books and is well-versed in the military strategy text Belleza Guerra, but she has been kept in ignorance of world affairs. With no warning, this fat, self-loathing princess is married off to a distant king and is embroiled in political and spiritual intrigue. War is coming, and perhaps only Elisa's Godstone—and knowledge from the Belleza Guerra—can save them. Elisa uses her untried strategic knowledge to always-good effect. With a character so smart that she doesn't have much to learn, body size is stereotypically substituted for character development. Elisa’s "mountainous" body shrivels away when she spends a month on forced march eating rat, and thus she is a better person. Still, it's wonderfully refreshing to see a heroine using her brain to win a war rather than strapping on a sword and charging into battle.
Despite the stale fat-to-curvy pattern, compelling world building with a Southern European, pseudo-Christian feel, reminiscent of Naomi Kritzer's Fires of the Faithful (2002), keeps this entry fresh. (Fantasy. 12-14)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-06-202648-4
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2011
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