NOW YOU SEE IT...

With her customary wry humor and fast-paced storytelling, Vande Velde propels a myopic, unhappy teen into other times and worlds. Stunned to discover that one popular classmate, Tiphanie, is actually a hideous old witch (in trendy teen clothing—just picture it) hiding behind a glamour, and another, Julian, is an elf prince in disguise, Wendy flees through a suddenly visible gate into the elven land of Kazaran Dahaani. She stays just long enough to see Julian captured by thugs, then stumbles back into her own world—only it’s 1953. There, she falls in with her own grandma, Helen, and in no time (so to speak) finds herself a reluctant member of a rescue expedition, following Helen, Tiphanie, and Henry—a tiny, compulsively mischievous “spreenie” with a big libido and a small attention span—to a dragon’s cave where Julian has been caged. A brisk but nonfatal dustup ensues, after which Wendy gets back to her old life, now better able to cope with her mother’s remarriage, and her grandma’s Alzheimer’s. Readers will be more captivated by the deliciously twisty plot and lively supporting cast, though, than by Wendy’s personal issues. (Fantasy. 11-13)