A great cover, a creepy gardener-cum-madman and a maddeningly clueless, nervous, blond young stepmother (shades of Joan Fontaine) combine a gothic story with a contemporary teen problem novel—but the resulting mystery is far too easily resolved. When her mother dies after a prolonged and devastating illness (chronicled in the first chapter), Nikki’s father marries the young illustrator of a book he is editing. Nikki’s resentment of her new stepmother quickly gives way to grudging protectiveness as Crystal shows herself incapable of self-assertion in the face of Nikki’s bull-headed father. Shortly after the wedding, Crystal inherits a house on the Northern California coast, and over Crystal’s objections, Nikki’s dad insists on moving his family to the beach for the summer. Here, Crystal’s unspoken fear of something dreadful in her past causes alarming nightmares, and Nikki’s impromptu job as secretarial assistant to the gruff owner of a neighboring beach house puts her in proximity to Bruce, the weird resident gardener. As the plot begins to thicken, lightning conveniently burns down the neighboring house—the very house, Crystal finally reveals, where Bruce brutally murdered her entire family when she was a small child. The gardener escapes the fire, however, leaving the reader to wonder about the chilling words Crystal speaks to Nikki in the novel’s last paragraph: “He’ll find you, Nikki,” she says. Though she’s ostensibly talking about Nikki’s budding summer romance with the neighbor’s son, cut short by the fire, the reader can only hope that no sequel is in the works. (Fiction. 11-14)
Pub Date: March 1, 2001
ISBN: 0-689-81671-5
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2002
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
A heartily satisfying string of entertaining near-catastrophes, replete with narrow squeaks and spectral howls.
Three young ghost trappers take on deadly wraiths and solve an old murder case in the bargain to kick off Stroud’s new post-Bartimaeus series.
Narrator Lucy Carlyle hopes to put her unusual sensitivity to supernatural sounds to good use by joining Lockwood & Co.—one of several firms that have risen to cope with the serious ghost Problem that has afflicted England in recent years. As its third member, she teams with glib, ambitious Anthony Lockwood and slovenly-but-capable scholar George Cubbins to entrap malign spirits for hire. The work is fraught with peril, not only because a ghost’s merest touch is generally fatal, but also, as it turns out, as none of the three is particularly good at careful planning and preparation. All are, however, resourceful and quick on their feet, which stands them in good stead when they inadvertently set fire to a house while discovering a murder victim’s desiccated corpse. It comes in handy again when they later rashly agree to clear Combe Carey Hall, renowned for centuries of sudden deaths and regarded as one of England’s most haunted manors. Despite being well-stocked with scream-worthy ghastlies, this lively opener makes a light alternative for readers who find the likes of Joseph Delaney’s Last Apprentice series too grim and creepy for comfort.
A heartily satisfying string of entertaining near-catastrophes, replete with narrow squeaks and spectral howls. (Ghost adventure. 11-13)Pub Date: Sept. 17, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4231-6491-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: May 28, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2013
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BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
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