OTTO TATTERCOAT AND THE FOREST OF LOST THINGS

When Otto’s mother disappears shortly after the pair arrives in Hodeldorf—“the coldest city in the world”—Otto meets an orphaned girl named Nim, and a series of adventures ensues.

The book evokes the worlds of Roald Dahl, Neil Gaiman, and traditional fairy tales. The third-person narrative meanders gracefully among the points of view of an omniscient narrator, Otto, and Nim. Naïve, kindhearted Otto is easily duped into servitude in the boot-polish factory of villainous Frau Ferber. Nim, motivated by guilt from an earlier encounter with Otto, manages to rescue him—and Otto expands his goal of finding his mother to rescuing all of Frau Ferber’s child labor force. Nim helps Otto join the tattercoats, a band of homeless children with a strict code of honor. Two of its five rules state that they must steal only what they need and that no one may possess more than one coat—despite the atrocious cold that forces them to sleep near people’s chimneys. Other than two brief, death-from-freezing descriptions, threatened dangers are frequent but violence rare; baddies meet imaginative but nonfatal justice. A misunderstood ex-tattercoat named Blink, a rat named Nibbles, and numerous forest denizens add humor and/or menace to an already engrossing tale. The light tone assures young readers that good will prevail over bad and that sometimes people just have to venture into the woods. All characters seem to be white.

Both charming and wise.