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THE CREAKERS

Name: THE CREAKERS
Author: Tom Fletcher
ISBN: 978-1-5247-7334-2

by Tom Fletcher & illustrated by Shane Devries ‧ RELEASE DATE: Sept. 10, 2019

Begins with a premise that doesn’t bear examination and goes badly off the rails toward the end: skip.

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Where have all the grown-ups gone, and why? Lucy finds the answers under her bed.

Suddenly left to their own devices, the children of Whiffington Town quickly devolve into a bewildered mob—except for 11-year-old Lucy Dungston. Unwillingly finding herself cast in the role of “the girl who knows what to do,” she determines to find out “what the jiggins is going on.” As it turns out, the garbage-loving, under-the-bed Creakers have bundled the adults off to the mysterious realm of Woleb to stop them from sending their lovely rubbish away to distant landfills. True to the spirit of his Dinosaur That Pooped a Planet (2017) and its sequels, Fletcher goes for the grotty, sending his doughty protagonist through slimy tunnels bearing an uncomfortable resemblance to alimentary tubes, past shops offering such delicacies as earwax ice cream, to a tavern where favored patrons get “extra snot drops” in their slops. From there the tale takes a distasteful white-savior turn: Lucy realizes that despite their nonstandard English and slovenly habits, Creakers have needs and children too, so she arranges to give them the moldering contents of the town dump. Devries’ playful illustrations feature wide-eyed humans (all white except for one 6-year-old brown-skinned diva with “bouncy hair” and her father) in expressive poses and stubby, comically ugly monsters.

Begins with a premise that doesn’t bear examination and goes badly off the rails toward the end: skip. (map) (Farce. 9-11)

Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019

ISBN: 978-1-5247-7334-2

Page Count: 368

Publisher: Random House

Review Posted Online: May 21, 2019

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2019

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S PARANORMAL & SUPERNATURAL

- BOOK REVIEW
THERE'S A BEAR IN YOUR BOOK
by Tom Fletcher ; illustrated by Tom Fletcher

- BOOK REVIEW
THERE'S A UNICORN IN YOUR BOOK
by Tom Fletcher ; illustrated by Greg Abbott

- BOOK REVIEW
THERE'S A WITCH IN YOUR BOOK
by Tom Fletcher ; illustrated by Greg Abbott

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MUSTACHES FOR MADDIE

by Chad Morris & Shelly Brown ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 3, 2017

Medically, both squicky and hopeful; emotionally, unbelievably squeaky-clean.

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A 12-year-old copes with a brain tumor.

Maddie likes potatoes and fake mustaches. Kids at school are nice (except one whom readers will see instantly is a bully); soon they’ll get to perform Shakespeare scenes in a unit they’ve all been looking forward to. But recent dysfunctions in Maddie’s arm and leg mean, stunningly, that she has a brain tumor. She has two surgeries, the first successful, the second taking place after the book’s end, leaving readers hanging. The tumor’s not malignant, but it—or the surgeries—could cause sight loss, personality change, or death. The descriptions of surgery aren’t for the faint of heart. The authors—parents of a real-life Maddie who really had a brain tumor—imbue fictional Maddie’s first-person narration with quirky turns of phrase (“For the love of potatoes!”) and whimsy (she imagines her medical battles as epic fantasy fights and pretends MRI stands for Mustard Rat from Indiana or Mustaches Rock Importantly), but they also portray her as a model sick kid. She’s frightened but never acts out, snaps, or resists. Her most frequent commentary about the tumor, having her skull opened, and the possibility of death is “Boo” or “Super boo.” She even shoulders the bully’s redemption. Maddie and most characters are white; one cringe-inducing hallucinatory surgery dream involves “chanting island natives” and a “witch doctor lady.”

Medically, both squicky and hopeful; emotionally, unbelievably squeaky-clean. (authors’ note, discussion questions) (Fiction. 9-11)

Pub Date: Oct. 3, 2017

ISBN: 978-1-62972-330-3

Page Count: 256

Publisher: Shadow Mountain

Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2017

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2017

Categories:

CHILDREN'S SOCIAL THEMES | CHILDREN'S HEALTH & DAILY LIVING

- BOOK REVIEW
THE WILD JOURNEY OF JUNIPER BERRY
by Chad Morris & Shelly Brown

- BOOK REVIEW
VIRTUALLY ME
by Chad Morris & Shelly Brown ; illustrated by Garth Bruner

- BOOK REVIEW
WILLA AND THE WHALE
by Chad Morris & Shelly Brown

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TUCK EVERLASTING

by Natalie Babbitt ‧ RELEASE DATE: Nov. 1, 1975

However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the...

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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.

However the compelling fitness of theme and event and the apt but unexpected imagery (the opening sentences compare the first week in August when this takes place to "the highest seat of a Ferris wheel when it pauses in its turning") help to justify the extravagant early assertion that had the secret about to be revealed been known at the time of the action, the very earth "would have trembled on its axis like a beetle on a pin." (Fantasy. 9-11)