The disappointing triumph of superficial style over substance.
A century apart, two preteens magically swap places and tackle an unsolved mystery: the theft of a painting by impressionist Mary Cassatt from a Newport, Rhode Island, mansion.
For Maggie, niece of the coal tycoon who built The Elms, it’s 1905. Twenty-first-century Hannah lives at The Elms, now a museum, with her caretaker father. She’s fascinated by the Gilded Age and the mystery of how Maggie’s portrait was stolen before it could be unveiled. When each suffers a fall, they discover they’ve switched bodies and can talk to each other through the mirror. Hannah, who knows the house and its history, seizes this chance to investigate the art heist. Learning of her portrait’s theft—due to occur that night—Maggie wants to help. While Hannah recruits Jonah, the kitchen boy who’ll be accused of the theft, Maggie studies Hannah’s iPhone and tries to learn soccer on the fly. Narrating alternate chapters, the girls discover that finding the culprit fails to return each to her time. First-person, present-tense narration works against the historical setting, and Hannah’s loud voice, crammed with pop-culture references to the Kardashians, hashtags, and port-a-potties, overwhelms any Gilded Age ambiance. Played for laughs, the 1905 denizens’ perplexity at her jargon soon palls. Though less tiresome, Maggie’s no more believable. Physical descriptions of characters are few, and race is never mentioned, but characters appear white, like The Elms’ historical occupants, Maggie’s family. Girl power and women’s progress toward equality are celebrated mainly in internal narration.
The disappointing triumph of superficial style over substance. (authors’ notes, bibliography) (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: Feb. 13, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4814-7871-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2017
A pleasing premise for book lovers.
A fantasy-loving bookworm makes a wonderful, terrible bargain.
When sixth grader Poppy Woodlock’s historic preservationist parents move the family to the Oregon coast to work on the titular stately home, Poppy’s sure she’ll find magic. Indeed, the exiled water nymph in the manor’s ruined swimming pool grants a wish, but: “Magic isn’t free. It cosssts.” The price? Poppy’s favorite book, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. In return she receives Sampson, a winged lion cub who is everything Poppy could have hoped for. But she soon learns that the nymph didn’t take just her own physical book—she erased Narnia from Poppy’s world. And it’s just the first loss: Soon, Poppy’s grandmother’s journal’s gone, then The Odyssey, and more. The loss is heartbreaking, but Sampson’s a wonderful companion, particularly as Poppy’s finding middle school a tough adjustment. Hartman’s premise is beguiling—plenty of readers will identify with Poppy, both as a fellow bibliophile and as a kid struggling to adapt. Poppy’s repeatedly expressed faith that unveiling Sampson will bring some sort of vindication wears thin, but that does not detract from the central drama. It’s a pity that the named real-world books Poppy reads are notably lacking in diversity; a story about the power of literature so limited in imagination lets both itself and readers down. Main characters are cued White; there is racial diversity in the supporting cast. Chapters open with atmospheric spot art. (This review has been updated to reflect the final illustrations.)
A pleasing premise for book lovers. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9780316448222
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...
At a time when death has become an acceptable, even voguish subject in children's fiction, Natalie Babbitt comes through with a stylistic gem about living forever.
Protected Winnie, the ten-year-old heroine, is not immortal, but when she comes upon young Jesse Tuck drinking from a secret spring in her parents' woods, she finds herself involved with a family who, having innocently drunk the same water some 87 years earlier, haven't aged a moment since. Though the mood is delicate, there is no lack of action, with the Tucks (previously suspected of witchcraft) now pursued for kidnapping Winnie; Mae Tuck, the middle aged mother, striking and killing a stranger who is onto their secret and would sell the water; and Winnie taking Mae's place in prison so that the Tucks can get away before she is hanged from the neck until....? Though Babbitt makes the family a sad one, most of their reasons for discontent are circumstantial and there isn't a great deal of wisdom to be gleaned from their fate or Winnie's decision not to share it.
Pub Date: Nov. 1, 1975
ISBN: 0312369816
Page Count: 164
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1975
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