A found-family tale that falls flat due to tired stereotypes.
A plucky young hero unravels a monster-filled mystery.
As an infant, Theodora was found swaddled in a graveyard in England by a kindly zombie and his vampire-cat companion. She was adopted by a good-natured group of monsters, who broke a strict tenet of their sacred charter by bringing a human into the mix. Now, 10 years later, Theodora attends Appleton Primary School. On the first day of Year Five, she meets and befriends Dexter Adebola, a new Nigerian American student. When odd occurrences begin to compound—sinister notes, trails of slimy earwax, and ominous corvids—Theodora knows she must uncover the nefarious source before her place within her beloved monster family is jeopardized. Kopy’s breezy offering is more fun than frightening, with conversational chapters that mostly culminate in page-turning cliffhangers but ultimately lead to a lackluster and hastily rendered conclusion. This work, which was originally published in the U.K. in 2020, contains some questionable representation. Brave and precocious Theodora is white; conversely, bespectacled, stuttering Dexter, who’s Black, serves as little more than an anxious sidekick. The depictions of women are also unfortunate: As the fight between good and evil culminates, the good monster is shown as thin, feminine, and conventionally attractive, whereas the bad one is fat and disabled and has hairy legs.
A found-family tale that falls flat due to tired stereotypes. (Paranormal mystery. 8-12)Pub Date: July 16, 2024
ISBN: 9781665906838
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2024
A candid and powerful reckoning of history.
Summer is off to a terrible start for 12-year old African-American Candice Miller.
Six months after her parents’ divorce, Candice and her mother leave Atlanta to spend the summer in Lambert, South Carolina, at her grandmother’s old house. When her grandmother Abigail passed two years ago, in 2015, Candice and her mother struggled to move on. Now, without any friends, a computer, cellphone, or her grandmother, Candice suffers immense loneliness and boredom. When she starts rummaging through the attic and stumbles upon a box of her grandmother’s belongings, she discovers an old letter that details a mysterious fortune buried in Lambert and that asks Abigail to find the treasure. After Candice befriends the shy, bookish African-American kid next door, 11-year-old Brandon Jones, the pair set off investigating the clues. Each new revelation uncovers a long history of racism and tension in the small town and how one family threatened the black/white status quo. Johnson’s latest novel holds racism firmly in the light. Candice and Brandon discover the joys and terrors of the reality of being African-American in the 1950s. Without sugarcoating facts or dousing it in post-racial varnish, the narrative lets the children absorb and reflect on their shared history. The town of Lambert brims with intrigue, keeping readers entranced until the very last page.
A candid and powerful reckoning of history. (Historical mystery. 8-12)Pub Date: March 27, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-545-94617-9
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Levine/Scholastic
Review Posted Online: Dec. 2, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2018
PROFILES
Delightful fun for budding mystery fans.
Only children, rejoice! A cozy mystery just for you! (People with siblings will probably enjoy it too.)
Debut novelist Cornett introduces the One and Onlys, a trio of mystery-solving only kids: Gloria Longshanks “Shanks” Hill, Alexander “Peephole” Calloway, and narrator Paul (alas, no nickname) Marconi. The trio has a knack for finding and solving low-level mysteries, but they come up against a true head-scratcher when the yard of a resident of their small town is covered in rubber ducks overnight. Working ahead of Officer Portnoy, who’s a little on the slow side, can Paul, Shanks, and Peephole solve the mystery? Cornett has a lot of fun with this adventure, dropping additional side mysteries, a subplot about small businesses, big corporations, and economics, and a town’s love of bratwurst into the mix. Most importantly, he plays fair with the clues throughout, allowing astute readers to potentially solve the case ahead of the trio. The tone and mystery are perfect for younger readers who want to test their detective skills but are put off by anything scary or gory. The pacing would serve well for chapter-by-chapter read-alouds. If there are any quibbles, it’s the lack of diversity of the cast, as it defaults white. Diversity exists in small towns, and this one is crying out for more. Hopefully a sequel will introduce additional faces.
Delightful fun for budding mystery fans. (Mystery. 8-12)Pub Date: April 14, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-3003-6
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
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