Despite unevenness, strong humor (from puns to Loki’s shenanigans) and hints at deeper frost giant machinations keep the...
Loki cuts Sif’s hair in this spin on the Norse myth set at Asgard Academy, first introduced in Freya and the Magic Jewel (2018).
Sif’s reluctant to share her gift for prophecy due to her struggles in reading runes and past mishaps (including a second-grade incident that cost her a best friend). She also has an interest in Thor (which Freya interprets as a crush—Sif isn’t so sure of that). Her fellow Thunder Girls suspect that Loki likes Sif and is messing with her to draw her attention away from Thor. Then Loki goes too far—cutting Sif’s hair, which is tied to her magic that enables the harvest on Midgard. This is terrible timing, as frost giants have been sneaking to Midgard to steal wheat, and signs point to a planned attack on Asgard. Now not only must Loki fix his misstep in order to avoid a food shortage, but Sif tasks him with bringing back five additional gifts for Asgard’s defense. Sif and Freya follow him to keep an eye on the troublemaker as he bargains with dwarf blacksmiths to restore Sif’s hair. Readers may be disappointed that Sif spends so much time as an observer—although there’s no question watching Loki is entertaining—and in the big reveal involving the second-grade incident and its solution, which feels anticlimactic after the buildup. The book assumes a white default.
Despite unevenness, strong humor (from puns to Loki’s shenanigans) and hints at deeper frost giant machinations keep the series moving. (further reading, glossary) (Fantasy. 8-12)Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4814-9643-8
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Aug. 13, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2018
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
Heartening and hopeful, a love letter to black male youth grasping the desires within them, absorbing the worlds around...
Cooler-than-cool newcomer Styx Malone takes the more-sheltered brothers Caleb and Bobby Gene on a mischievous, path-altering, summer adventure of a lifetime as they embrace the extraordinary possibilities beyond the everyday in rural Indiana.
Readers may think an adventure such as they’ll find here wouldn’t be possible in the present day; this story takes place outside, where nature, know-how, creativity, and curiosity rule. Creeks, dirt roads, buried treasures, and more make up the landscape in Sutton, Indiana. Younger brother Caleb narrates, letting readers know from the outset that he’s tired of his dad’s racially tinged determination that they be safely ordinary: “I don’t want to be ordinary. I want to be…the other thing.” With Styx Malone around, Caleb and Bobby Gene will sure figure out what that “other thing” can become. The three black adolescents are enchanted with the miracle of the Great Escalator Trade, the mythic one-thing-leads-to-another bartering scheme that just might get them farther from Sutton than they’ve ever dreamed. As they get deeper and deeper into cahoots with Styx, they begin to notice that Styx harbors some secret ambitions of his own, further twisting this grand summer journey. “How do you move through the world knowing that you’re special, when no one else can see it?” begs the soul of this novel.
Heartening and hopeful, a love letter to black male youth grasping the desires within them, absorbing the worlds around them, striving to be more otherwise than ordinary. Please share. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Oct. 16, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5247-1595-3
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Wendy Lamb/Random
Review Posted Online: July 15, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2018
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
