A winning testament to the value of friendship and to a surly dragon’s power of persuasion.
Caution: a wyvern’s talons might pluck you up and drop you smack in the middle of a legendary quest.
Indomitable duo Karn and Thianna went their separate ways after battling the undead and outwitting ornery dragon Orm in Frostborn (2014). Karn now lives the life of a lauded hero. Content but somewhat jaded, he pines for the excitement and camaraderie he shared with Thianna. Enter Orm, who recruits Karn to seek the second Horn of Osius, an ancient relic capable of commanding dragons (Orm digested the first horn in book one to safeguard his kind). Karn is reluctant until he learns that Thianna was the initial recruit and has since disappeared. As Karn endeavors to solve an ancient riddle that will lead him to the horn and, more importantly, to Thianna, reminders abound that a soft heart is compatible with strength and resilience. As he did in the preceding volume, Anders presents a captivating world of richly imagined biomes, grim outlooks, plenty of gaming, and fantasy fauna (giant bats, gnomes, a pride of manticores preoccupied with manure). Whereas the first book was characterized by a fair amount of adult guidance, this tale is primarily propelled by young protagonists and antagonists (an enthralling doppelgänger dark elf pair also seeks the horn). In turn, Karn and Thianna are more defiant, less naïve, and have more to lose this time around—namely each other—but they refuse to lose themselves.
A winning testament to the value of friendship and to a surly dragon’s power of persuasion. (maps, glossary, game rules, “historical” note) (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: July 14, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-39036-1
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: May 11, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
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
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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