Another sequel is in the offing, and young mystery fans should be glad.
Wallace and Mason Investigations is on the case of the missing mascot.
Noir-obsessed Howard Wallace and down-to-earth Ivy Mason, middle school detectives, catch a new case. Junk-shop owner Marvin, to whom Howard owes many favors, wants his grandnephew Carl’s name cleared. It seems that Carl, who happens to be on Howard’s enemies list (for wedgies past), stands accused of kidnapping his own basketball team’s mascot, Spartacus the pug, and so he’s been suspended from the team. Howard and Ivy take the case, but due to past problems at school, they can’t detect during the week. That stricture is lifted when coach Mr. Williams hires them to find the pug before the big game. Twists turn and turn again, and the detective duo nearly breaks up as they work and surprise themselves by teaming with former enemies. Lyall’s sophomore effort lacks some of the zing of series opener Howard Wallace, P.I. (2016), but mystery fans should enjoy it anyway. It leaps from the tired trope of the stolen mascot to land in new territory, and the characters interact realistically and have real kid problems. It doesn’t have much to do with Shadow of a Doubt, from which it surely draws its name, but the target audience won’t notice. Ethnicity is denoted with naming conventions; the story hews to the white default.
Another sequel is in the offing, and young mystery fans should be glad. (Mystery. 8-12)Pub Date: Sept. 5, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4549-1955-1
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Sterling
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often...
A successful juvenile by the beloved New Yorker writer portrays a farm episode with an imaginative twist that makes a poignant, humorous story of a pig, a spider and a little girl.
Young Fern Arable pleads for the life of runt piglet Wilbur and gets her father to sell him to a neighbor, Mr. Zuckerman. Daily, Fern visits the Zuckermans to sit and muse with Wilbur and with the clever pen spider Charlotte, who befriends him when he is lonely and downcast. At the news of Wilbur's forthcoming slaughter, campaigning Charlotte, to the astonishment of people for miles around, spins words in her web. "Some Pig" comes first. Then "Terrific"—then "Radiant". The last word, when Wilbur is about to win a show prize and Charlotte is about to die from building her egg sac, is "Humble". And as the wonderful Charlotte does die, the sadness is tempered by the promise of more spiders next spring.
The three way chats, in which they are joined by other animals, about web spinning, themselves, other humans—are as often informative as amusing, and the whole tenor of appealing wit and pathos will make fine entertainment for reading aloud, too.Pub Date: Oct. 15, 1952
ISBN: 978-0-06-026385-0
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Sept. 14, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1952
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
A real gem.
A 10-year old girl learns to adjust to a strange town, makes some fascinating friends, and fills the empty space in her heart thanks to a big old stray dog in this lyrical, moving, and enchanting book by a fresh new voice.
India Opal’s mama left when she was only three, and her father, “the preacher,” is absorbed in his own loss and in the work of his new ministry at the Open-Arms Baptist Church of Naomi [Florida]. Enter Winn-Dixie, a dog who “looked like a big piece of old brown carpet that had been left out in the rain.” But, this dog had a grin “so big that it made him sneeze.” And, as Opal says, “It’s hard not to immediately fall in love with a dog who has a good sense of humor.” Because of Winn-Dixie, Opal meets Miss Franny Block, an elderly lady whose papa built her a library of her own when she was just a little girl and she’s been the librarian ever since. Then, there’s nearly blind Gloria Dump, who hangs the empty bottle wreckage of her past from the mistake tree in her back yard. And, Otis, oh yes, Otis, whose music charms the gerbils, rabbits, snakes and lizards he’s let out of their cages in the pet store. Brush strokes of magical realism elevate this beyond a simple story of friendship to a well-crafted tale of community and fellowship, of sweetness, sorrow and hope. And, it’s funny, too.
A real gem. (Fiction. 9-12)Pub Date: March 1, 2000
ISBN: 0-7636-0776-2
Page Count: 182
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2000
SEEN & HEARD
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