A thrilling, transportive historical adventure that offers hope and explores themes of found family.
Thirteen-year-old Malcolm McKenzie’s wits are tested in this atmospheric mystery set in Scotland in 1902.
The orphaned Malcolm lives in Mrs. McCardle’s Home for Children and is apprenticed to Jack Alexander, a clockmaker and inventor. Malcolm’s good friends with Jack’s son, Peter, and is a regular visitor to the Alexander home, where Peter’s aunt also lives. The novel unfolds around two intertwining and mysterious misfortunes that strike the family: a strange illness that Peter succumbs to, followed by Jack’s murder. Mahoney explores the world of Edinburgh’s first generation of female physicians through the character of Dr. Fiona MacIsaac, who plays a prominent role in Peter’s care and is present when Malcolm discovers Jack’s body in a locked church tower. When Malcolm takes up Jack’s interrupted quest to help Peter, Dr. MacIsaac provides a crucial piece of the puzzle—an item that may lead to a healing serum. Malcolm’s sleuthing leads him all over the city and offers insights into the fascinating and intricate worlds of early-20th-century medicine and clockmaking. This mystery, which features a white-presenting cast, will appeal to readers who enjoy historical settings, intriguing puzzles, and some element of danger. The author brings to life the richly evoked Edinburgh through descriptive writing as well as its residents’ speech patterns.
A thrilling, transportive historical adventure that offers hope and explores themes of found family. (glossary, author’s note) (Historical mystery. 10-13)Pub Date: Oct. 19, 2024
ISBN: 9781770867604
Page Count: 216
Publisher: DCB Young Readers
Review Posted Online: Aug. 30, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish.
The dreary prospect of spending a lifetime making caskets instead of wonderful inventions prompts a young orphan to snatch up his little sister and flee. Where? To the circus, of course.
Fortunately or otherwise, John and 6-year-old Page join up with Boz—sometime human cannonball for the seedy Wandering Wayfarers and a “vertically challenged” trickster with a fantastic gift for sowing chaos. Alas, the budding engineer barely has time to settle in to begin work on an experimental circus wagon powered by chicken poop and dubbed (with questionable forethought) the Autopsy. The hot pursuit of malign and indomitable Great-Aunt Beauregard, the Coggins’ only living relative, forces all three to leave the troupe for further flights and misadventures. Teele spins her adventure around a sturdy protagonist whose love for his little sister is matched only by his fierce desire for something better in life for them both and tucks in an outstanding supporting cast featuring several notably strong-minded, independent women (Page, whose glare “would kill spiders dead,” not least among them). Better yet, in Boz she has created a scene-stealing force of nature, a free spirit who’s never happier than when he’s stirring up mischief. A climactic clutch culminating in a magnificently destructive display of fireworks leaves the Coggin sibs well-positioned for bright futures. (Illustrations not seen.)
A sly, side-splitting hoot from start to finish. (Adventure. 11-13)Pub Date: April 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234510-3
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Walden Pond Press/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
Dolphin lovers will appreciate this look at our complicated relationship with these marine mammals.
Is dolphin-assisted therapy so beneficial to patients that it’s worth keeping a wild dolphin captive?
Twelve-year-old Lily has lived with her emotionally distant oncologist stepfather and a succession of nannies since her mother died in a car accident two years ago. Nannies leave because of the difficulty of caring for Adam, Lily’s severely autistic 4-year-old half brother. The newest, Suzanne, seems promising, but Lily is tired of feeling like a planet orbiting the sun Adam. When she meets blind Zoe, who will attend the same private middle school as Lily in the fall, Lily’s happy to have a friend. However, Zoe’s take on the plight of the captive dolphin, Nori, used in Adam’s therapy opens Lily’s eyes. She knows she must use her influence over her stepfather, who is consulting on Nori’s treatment for cancer (caused by an oil spill), to free the animal. Lily’s got several fine lines to walk, as she works to hold onto her new friend, convince her stepfather of the rightness of releasing Nori, and do what’s best for Adam. In her newest exploration of animal-human relationships, Rorby’s lonely, mature heroine faces tough but realistic situations. Siblings of children on the spectrum will identify with Lily. If the tale flirts with sentimentality and some of the characters are strident in their views, the whole never feels maudlin or didactic.
Dolphin lovers will appreciate this look at our complicated relationship with these marine mammals. (Fiction. 10-13)Pub Date: May 26, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-545-67605-2
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2015
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