It's difficult to remember that this island castle, domain of the fanatical tyrant Don Enrique de Cabrillo y Benivides and prison for his beautiful daughter Lucinda, is a contemporary setting. That is the intent of Don Enrique, who won't allow electricity, radio, or newspapers on the island and forbids his daughter to visit the mainland or read anything published in the 20th century. Don Enrique also boasts of having sealed up his wife's lover in her closet (the stone wall he had built still stands, though the wife has fled), and he has imported a succession of pretty young gringas, none of whom has met his standards for a mistress. In the course of the story, after Lucinda has made one unsuccessful attempt to escape the island, and after the eighteenth gringas has been sent off (her offense was playing a modern record on a forbidden player) and a nineteenth, more promising replacement arrives, Lucinda becomes aware that all is hot right: The eighteen rejected gringas have not been sent home but lie in eighteen crystal caskets in the castle cellar vault; and—between importing conquistadors' bones for reburial and ordering a nineteenth casket—Don Enrique is currently plotting to seize a nearby atomic power plant as part of his plan to regain the land from Spain and effect revenge upon the gringos. After all this, Lucinda's shock of recognition comes across as a bit anticlimactic: "At this moment, as I met his gaze, all of the suspicions that had built up in me during the past weeks suddenly came together in one unshakable truth. My father, Don Enrique de Cabrillo y Benivides, was deranged." The melodrama comes to a head when Don Enrique is killed by the deadly bushmaster snake that guards the caskets, and Lucinda, aided by a coast guard cutter and a young anthropologist in her father's employ, must battle Don Enrique's island army and his sinister henchmen to gain control of the island and her own future. Hokey extravaganza with a vengeance, but sure to find its breathless audience.
Pub Date: Oct. 25, 1982
ISBN: 0449700941
Page Count: -
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1982
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Broccoli: No way is James going to eat broccoli. “It’s disgusting,” says James. Well then, James, says his father, let’s consider the alternatives: some wormy dirt, perhaps, some stinky socks, some pre-chewed gum? James reconsiders the broccoli, but—milk? “Blech,” says James. Right, says his father, who needs strong bones? You’ll be great at hide-and-seek, though not so great at baseball and kickball and even tickling the dog’s belly. James takes a mouthful. So it goes through lumpy oatmeal, mushroom lasagna and slimy eggs, with James’ father parrying his son’s every picky thrust. And it is fun, because the father’s retorts are so outlandish: the lasagna-making troll in the basement who will be sent back to the rat circus, there to endure the rodent’s vicious bites; the uneaten oatmeal that will grow and grow and probably devour the dog that the boy won’t be able to tickle any longer since his bones are so rubbery. Schneider’s watercolors catch the mood of gentle ribbing, the looks of bewilderment and surrender and the deadpanned malarkey. It all makes James’ father’s last urging—“I was just going to say that you might like them if you tried them”—wholly fresh and unexpected advice. (Early reader. 5-9)
Pub Date: May 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-547-14956-1
Page Count: 48
Publisher: Clarion Books
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity.
A collection of parental wishes for a child.
It starts out simply enough: two children run pell-mell across an open field, one holding a high-flying kite with the line “I wish you more ups than downs.” But on subsequent pages, some of the analogous concepts are confusing or ambiguous. The line “I wish you more tippy-toes than deep” accompanies a picture of a boy happily swimming in a pool. His feet are visible, but it's not clear whether he's floating in the deep end or standing in the shallow. Then there's a picture of a boy on a beach, his pockets bulging with driftwood and colorful shells, looking frustrated that his pockets won't hold the rest of his beachcombing treasures, which lie tantalizingly before him on the sand. The line reads: “I wish you more treasures than pockets.” Most children will feel the better wish would be that he had just the right amount of pockets for his treasures. Some of the wordplay, such as “more can than knot” and “more pause than fast-forward,” will tickle older readers with their accompanying, comical illustrations. The beautifully simple pictures are a sweet, kid- and parent-appealing blend of comic-strip style and fine art; the cast of children depicted is commendably multiethnic.
Although the love comes shining through, the text often confuses in straining for patterned simplicity. (Picture book. 5-8)Pub Date: April 1, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4521-2699-9
Page Count: 40
Publisher: Chronicle Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2015
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