More character study than anything else, this book delves deep.
A shared interest in dolls and dollhouses forms the foundation of an unexpected intergenerational friendship.
Tiphany Stokes, a preteen, and Szilvia Rózsahegyi, a self-described “old bat,” are new to town, and both are lonely. So when Tiph does the old woman a good turn outside the dollhouse store whose window she haunts, the ensuing conversation leads to a business arrangement: Tiph will walk Ms. Rózsahegyi’s dog and clean her cat’s litter box. Her new employer instructs Tiph to call her Szilvia Néni, the Hungarian for “Aunt Szilvia,” which Tiph instantly Americanizes to Néni Szilvia, and a friendship grows. In interleaved chapters, another begins between two antique dolls, Gretel and Little Red Riding Hood, who find their way from the dollhouse store to Néni Szilvia’s house: Red as part of the old woman’s project to restore the dollhouse her father built for her decades ago and Gretel in Tiph’s pocket. By night, the two dolls explore their new environs, “daredevil” Red coaxing the more timid Gretel out of her comfort zone. Schlitz tenderly develops her characters, giving each a rough-edged complexity. Her portrayal of Tiph’s relationship with her stepmother is especially skillful. Tiph is a basically decent kid, but she’s far from perfect. It’s Schlitz’s clear-eyed portrayal of Tiph’s emotional inner life that anchors this cozy fantasy, with the dolls’ nocturnal adventures providing lift. Main characters present white.
More character study than anything else, this book delves deep. (Fantasy. 10-12)Pub Date: Sept. 2, 2025
ISBN: 9781536236088
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Candlewick
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2025
On equal footing with a garden-variety potato.
The new kid in school endures becoming the school mascot.
Ben Hardy has never cared for potatoes, and this distaste has become a barrier to adjusting to life in his new Idaho town. His school’s mascot is the Spud, and after a series of misfortunes, Ben is enlisted to don the potato costume and cheer on his school’s team. Ben balances his duties as a life-sized potato against his desperate desire to hide the fact that he’s the dork in the suit. After all, his cute new crush, Jayla, wouldn’t be too impressed to discover Ben’s secret. The ensuing novel is a fairly boilerplate middle–grade narrative: snarky tween protagonist, the crush that isn’t quite what she seems, and a pair of best friends that have more going on than our hero initially believes. The author keeps the novel moving quickly, pushing forward with witty asides and narrative momentum so fast that readers won’t really mind that the plot’s spine is one they’ve encountered many times before. Once finished, readers will feel little resonance and move on to the next book in their to-read piles, but in the moment the novel is pleasant enough. Ben, Jayla, and Ben’s friend Hunter are white while Ellie, Ben’s other good pal, is Latina.
On equal footing with a garden-variety potato. (Fiction. 10-12)Pub Date: March 24, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-593-11866-5
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy.
Inventively tweaking a popular premise, Jensen pits two Incredibles-style families with superpowers against each other—until a new challenge rises to unite them.
The Johnsons invariably spit at the mere mention of their hated rivals, the Baileys. Likewise, all Baileys habitually shake their fists when referring to the Johnsons. Having long looked forward to getting a superpower so that he too can battle his clan’s nemeses, Rafter Bailey is devastated when, instead of being able to fly or something else cool, he acquires the “power” to strike a match on soft polyester. But when hated classmate Juanita Johnson turns up newly endowed with a similarly bogus power and, against all family tradition, they compare notes, it becomes clear that something fishy is going on. Both families regard themselves as the heroes and their rivals as the villains. Someone has been inciting them to fight each other. Worse yet, that someone has apparently developed a device that turns real superpowers into silly ones. Teaching themselves on the fly how to get past their prejudice and work together, Rafter, his little brother, Benny, and Juanita follow a well-laid-out chain of clues and deductions to the climactic discovery of a third, genuinely nefarious family, the Joneses, and a fiendishly clever scheme to dispose of all the Baileys and Johnsons at once. Can they carry the day?
A solid debut: fluent, funny and eminently sequel-worthy. (Adventure. 10-12)Pub Date: Jan. 21, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-06-220961-0
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 1, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
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