Serious, jolly, and instructive—an entertaining Christmas adventure in the best spirit of the season.
This middle-grade sequel sees a young teen return to a fantasy world and battle a troll who has plunged the land into despair.
Christmas is fast approaching in Minneapolis. Thirteen-year-old Toby Baxter, never much of a reader, is trying to engage with his mom’s favorite holiday book: Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Unsurprisingly, the boy is more interested in having his new friend Sid sleep over—and in returning to RiverHome, the magical land that Toby can access by way of a magical portal in his closet. For Toby, only a few months have passed since his first heroic undertakings in RiverHome. But time being tricky, several years have gone by there. The magical barrier that Toby set in place has shattered, and the land has sickened, mostly due to the hope-bringing Christmas Giant having surrendered to the Scrooge-like troll war leader Clygon. Toby is reunited with his elvish and gnome friends yet is soon captured and taken to the stronghold where troll mercenaries are holding the Christmas Giant. Toby’s dad and Sid pass through the wardrobe and are faced with the same miserable situation. Can the trio save RiverHome and thwart Clygon’s schemes? Wright employs a straightforward narrative in the third person, past tense, writing primarily from Toby’s or Sid’s perspective but with italicized metatextual asides that break the fourth wall (or its literary equivalent). For example: “The plan was for Toby to—lie on the sled?...lay on the sled? Why can’t he ever figure that one out?—and slide down the roof onto the ground below.” Most of these interjections relate to grammar and thus serve not only to jab playfully at language pedants, but also to sneakily foreground and complement themes of literary awareness. As with the previous book, Toby’s heroism takes a nontraditional form. He tries to defeat Clygon not through physical means, but rather by deploying a kind of weaponized empathy. The story moves quickly, though it is rendered a little befuddling due to its large cast of characters, many of whom play little part in the outcome. Yet even this superfluity adds to the holiday atmosphere, as if Wright had invited a vast extended family for dinner. Fans of Toby’s first outing will enjoy this get-together.
Serious, jolly, and instructive—an entertaining Christmas adventure in the best spirit of the season.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2023
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: Amazon Book Marketing Pros
Review Posted Online: Oct. 11, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
File under “laugh riot.”
A rogue spell-check program’s bid to transform all life-forms into that eminently useful office item, the paper clip, touches off a fresh round of lunar lunacy.
Predicated on the entirely reasonable premise that eliminating all spelling and grammar errors everywhere would logically lead to the necessity of exterminating carbon-based life in the universe, this third series entry combines high stakes with daffy banter and daring exploits. CheckMate—a chipper, jumped-up editing program—has invented the Transmogratron, a giant laser that will fulfill its ultimate goals in both the cyber world and “meatspace.” Facing challenges as random as prankster lunar unicorns and a disarmingly motherly Motherboard, scowling First Cat joins a motley crew of diversely carbon- and silicon-based allies, led by the pearlescent Queen of the Moon. They’re in a race to the finish—diverted occasionally by, for instance, a relentlessly punny comic-book interlude featuring a pair of literal and figurative Pool Sharks. They ultimately triumph thanks to teamwork and moxie. Following a celebratory party and toasts to “new friends…and steadfast comrades” (and, of course, “MEOW”), the story’s energetic, brightly colored panels close with a reveal of the next volume. (“I always hate it when comics end by announcing a sequel. SO CRINGE!” declares an authorial stand-in.) It can’t come too soon.
File under “laugh riot.” (Graphic science fiction. 8-11)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2024
ISBN: 9780063315280
Page Count: 272
Publisher: HarperAlley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A fizzy mix of low humor and brisk action, with promise of more of both to come.
Heroic deeds await Isaac after his little sister runs into the school basement and is captured by elves.
Even though their school is a spooky old castle transplanted stone by stone from Germany, Isaac and his two friends, Max and Emma, little suspect that an entire magical kingdom lies beneath—a kingdom run by elves, policed by oversized rats in uniform, and populated by captives who start out human but undergo transformative “weirding.” These revelations await Isaac and sidekicks as they nerve themselves to trail his bossy younger sib, Lily, through a shadowy storeroom and into a tunnel, across a wide lake, and into a city lit by half-human fireflies, where they are cast together into a dungeon. Can they escape before they themselves start changing? Gibson pits his doughty rescuers against such adversaries as an elven monarch who emits truly kingly belches and a once-human jailer with a self-picking nose. Tests of mettle range from a riddle contest to a face-off with the menacing head rat Shelfliver, and a helter-skelter chase finally leads rescuers and rescued back to the aboveground. Plainly, though, there is further rescuing to be done.
A fizzy mix of low humor and brisk action, with promise of more of both to come. (Fantasy. 9-11)Pub Date: Aug. 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-62370-255-7
Page Count: 160
Publisher: Capstone Young Readers
Review Posted Online: June 28, 2015
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