A swashbuckling bit of storytime or bedroom décor, though not even Davy Jones would want the perfunctory plot summaries and...
Avast! Hidden treasure—of a sort—awaits discovery by budding corsairs and cutthroat knaves who delve into this slender collection of pirate tales.
Fastened to the right, me hearties, be a booklet with six superficial, sanitized retellings of public-domain yarns by the (unattributed) likes of Robert Louis Stevenson (Treasure Island) and Daniel Defoe (The Life, Adventures and Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton, here rendered as “The Captain’s Secret”). All these renditions are much improved by Robertson’s painted images of glaring buccaneers in colorful period dress and settings. On the left lurks a pirate in a box. Aye, unfolding to a height of slightly over 4 feet and printed on heavy card stock with grommets for hanging up is a piratical figure in full pop-out regalia. He brandishes a minisaber and poses with a dagger, a treasure map, a “black spot” (see Stevenson, above) and other items removable or otherwise keyed to the tales placed to the side or secreted in various pockets.
A swashbuckling bit of storytime or bedroom décor, though not even Davy Jones would want the perfunctory plot summaries and recast scenes in the accompanying literary afterthought. (Novelty. 5-8)Pub Date: Aug. 6, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4549-0414-4
Page Count: 24
Publisher: Sterling
Review Posted Online: Oct. 8, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Only for dedicated fans of the series.
When a kid gets the part of the ninja master in the school play, it finally seems to be the right time to tackle the closet monster.
“I spot my monster right away. / He’s practicing his ROAR. / He almost scares me half to death, / but I won’t be scared anymore!” The monster is a large, fluffy poison-green beast with blue hands and feet and face and a fluffy blue-and-green–striped tail. The kid employs a “bag of tricks” to try to catch the monster: in it are a giant wind-up shark, two cans of silly string, and an elaborate cage-and-robot trap. This last works, but with an unexpected result: the monster looks sad. Turns out he was only scaring the boy to wake him up so they could be friends. The monster greets the boy in the usual monster way: he “rips a massive FART!!” that smells like strawberries and lime, and then they go to the monster’s house to meet his parents and play. The final two spreads show the duo getting ready for bed, which is a rather anticlimactic end to what has otherwise been a rambunctious tale. Elkerton’s bright illustrations have a TV-cartoon aesthetic, and his playful beast is never scary. The narrator is depicted with black eyes and hair and pale skin. Wallace’s limping verses are uninspired at best, and the scansion and meter are frequently off.
Only for dedicated fans of the series. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4926-4894-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Review Posted Online: July 14, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A gentle adventure that sets the stage for future quests.
A lonely prince gains a friend for a quest to find a missing jewel.
Prince Lucas of Wrenly has everything a boy could possibly want—except a friend. His father has forbidden him to play with the village children for reasons of propriety. Adventure-seeking Lucas acquires peasant clothes to masquerade as a commoner and make friends, but he is caught out. His mother, the queen, persuades the king to allow him one friend: Clara, the daughter of her personal dressmaker. When the queen’s prized emerald pendant goes missing, Lucas and Clara set off to find it. They follow the jewel as it changes hands, interviewing each temporary owner. Their adventure cleverly introduces the series’ world and peoples, taking the children to the fairy island of Primlox, the trolls’ home of Burth, the wizard island of Hobsgrove and finally Mermaid’s Cove. By befriending the mermaids, Lucas and Clara finally recover the jewel. In thanks, the king gives Clara a horse of her own so that she may ride with Lucas on their future adventures. The third-person narration is generally unobtrusive, allowing the characters to take center stage. The charming, medieval-flavored illustrations set the fairy-tale scene and take up enough page space that new and reluctant readers won’t be overwhelmed by text.
A gentle adventure that sets the stage for future quests. (Fantasy. 5-8)Pub Date: April 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4424-9691-0
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Little Simon/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Feb. 11, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2014
BOOK REVIEW
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