A captivating and charming adventure sure to please young readers and longtime fans.
The rise and re-education of an unlikely champion by the author of Ella Enchanted.
Blunt and competitive, unpopular Peregrine seeks the approval of her adoptive parents, Lady Klausine and Lord Tove. Raised to believe in Lakti superiority and that the conquered Bamarre are “lucky to be ruled by us,” Peregrine discovers she was born a Bamarre. Reluctant to don the symbolic green tassel of servitude—the only visible difference between the otherwise racially indistinguishable two groups, members of which may be either “pale or dark”—15-year-old Peregrine proves her valor in battle but must flee Tove’s wrath. Relying on her surly maid (and birth sister), Annet, Peregrine seeks refuge with her peasant birth family yet finds she is equally ill-suited to being a cooperative, courteous Bamarre—except for her love of poetry. When the Lakti deem the Bamarre servants/serfs “beings” but not “people” and impose outrageous restrictions, Peregrine seeks freedom for the Bamarre, even if it means fighting monsters both magical…and human. Peregrine’s significant social shortcomings set her apart from the current plethora of martial heroines, and the requisite romance—with a love interest beset by various temporary physical impediments (deafness, blindness)—is wistful but not melodramatic. Levine riffs gently on “Rapunzel” and delivers an arch appraisal of discrimination and bigotry, cloaked in a magical, medieval, vaguely European fairy-tale setting.
A captivating and charming adventure sure to please young readers and longtime fans. (Fantasy. 8-14)Pub Date: May 2, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-06-207466-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: March 5, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2017
A pleasing premise for book lovers.
A fantasy-loving bookworm makes a wonderful, terrible bargain.
When sixth grader Poppy Woodlock’s historic preservationist parents move the family to the Oregon coast to work on the titular stately home, Poppy’s sure she’ll find magic. Indeed, the exiled water nymph in the manor’s ruined swimming pool grants a wish, but: “Magic isn’t free. It cosssts.” The price? Poppy’s favorite book, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. In return she receives Sampson, a winged lion cub who is everything Poppy could have hoped for. But she soon learns that the nymph didn’t take just her own physical book—she erased Narnia from Poppy’s world. And it’s just the first loss: Soon, Poppy’s grandmother’s journal’s gone, then The Odyssey, and more. The loss is heartbreaking, but Sampson’s a wonderful companion, particularly as Poppy’s finding middle school a tough adjustment. Hartman’s premise is beguiling—plenty of readers will identify with Poppy, both as a fellow bibliophile and as a kid struggling to adapt. Poppy’s repeatedly expressed faith that unveiling Sampson will bring some sort of vindication wears thin, but that does not detract from the central drama. It’s a pity that the named real-world books Poppy reads are notably lacking in diversity; a story about the power of literature so limited in imagination lets both itself and readers down. Main characters are cued White; there is racial diversity in the supporting cast. Chapters open with atmospheric spot art. (This review has been updated to reflect the final illustrations.)
A pleasing premise for book lovers. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9780316448222
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Feb. 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
Good Guys and Bad get just deserts in the end, and Stanley gets plenty of opportunities to display pluck and valor in this...
Sentenced to a brutal juvenile detention camp for a crime he didn't commit, a wimpy teenager turns four generations of bad family luck around in this sunburnt tale of courage, obsession, and buried treasure from Sachar (Wayside School Gets a Little Stranger, 1995, etc.).
Driven mad by the murder of her black beau, a schoolteacher turns on the once-friendly, verdant town of Green Lake, Texas, becomes feared bandit Kissin' Kate Barlow, and dies, laughing, without revealing where she buried her stash. A century of rainless years later, lake and town are memories—but, with the involuntary help of gangs of juvenile offenders, the last descendant of the last residents is still digging. Enter Stanley Yelnats IV, great-grandson of one of Kissin' Kate's victims and the latest to fall to the family curse of being in the wrong place at the wrong time; under the direction of The Warden, a woman with rattlesnake venom polish on her long nails, Stanley and each of his fellow inmates dig a hole a day in the rock-hard lake bed. Weeks of punishing labor later, Stanley digs up a clue, but is canny enough to conceal the information of which hole it came from. Through flashbacks, Sachar weaves a complex net of hidden relationships and well-timed revelations as he puts his slightly larger-than-life characters under a sun so punishing that readers will be reaching for water bottles.
Good Guys and Bad get just deserts in the end, and Stanley gets plenty of opportunities to display pluck and valor in this rugged, engrossing adventure. (Fiction. 9-13)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 1998
ISBN: 978-0-374-33265-5
Page Count: 233
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2000
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