Cinematic, amusing, and exciting: a slightly subversive, delightfully empowering, all-around winner.
Magdalena Fishbone’s relegation to an institution for “orphans, runaways, and wayward girls” turns into an extraordinary adventure.
When Maggie arrives at the Midwatch Institute (after committing a satisfying, if somewhat violent, act of justice), she’s one of three new girls. As it turns out, the seemingly dreary orphanage is a front for a school that trains girls in useful arts and skills. Maggie’s classes in “Maps, Fencing, German, Motorcars, Drawing, Observing, Contriving, Hiding, and Dancing” comprise a fine beginning education for any spy or detective. Excerpts from Useful Things Every Girl Should Know, a book published in 1911 by the director, Miss Adelia Mandelay, appear between chapters and include instruction and advice on, among other things, disguises, decision-making, Morse code, knot tying, and escaping from quicksand. Most entries include anecdotes from the author’s madcap experiences as an international woman of mystery. Rich, quirky language and a well-imagined early-20th-century setting—including a port city with skyscrapers, airships, motorcars, and an elegant hotel—provide an immersive backdrop for the girls’ foray into detective work. The disappearance of a botanist and attacks by a creature the press calls “the night monster” are elements of the criminal conspiracy the girls uncover. Terrifically evocative black-and-white illustrations extend the narrative. Maggie and the adults appear white, and some of Maggie’s schoolmates have dark skin.
Cinematic, amusing, and exciting: a slightly subversive, delightfully empowering, all-around winner. (Mystery. 8-12)Pub Date: May 27, 2025
ISBN: 9798217002405
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2025
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs.
The Heffley family’s house undergoes a disastrous attempt at home improvement.
When Great Aunt Reba dies, she leaves some money to the family. Greg’s mom calls a family meeting to determine what to do with their share, proposing home improvements and then overruling the family’s cartoonish wish lists and instead pushing for an addition to the kitchen. Before bringing in the construction crew, the Heffleys attempt to do minor maintenance and repairs themselves—during which Greg fails at the work in various slapstick scenes. Once the professionals are brought in, the problems keep getting worse: angry neighbors, terrifying problems in walls, and—most serious—civil permitting issues that put the kibosh on what work’s been done. Left with only enough inheritance to patch and repair the exterior of the house—and with the school’s dismal standardized test scores as a final straw—Greg’s mom steers the family toward moving, opening up house-hunting and house-selling storylines (and devastating loyal Rowley, who doesn’t want to lose his best friend). While Greg’s positive about the move, he’s not completely uncaring about Rowley’s action. (And of course, Greg himself is not as unaffected as he wishes.) The gags include effectively placed callbacks to seemingly incidental events (the “stress lizard” brought in on testing day is particularly funny) and a lampoon of after-school-special–style problem books. Just when it seems that the Heffleys really will move, a new sequence of chaotic trouble and property destruction heralds a return to the status quo. Whew.
Readers can still rely on this series to bring laughs. (Graphic/fiction hybrid. 8-12)Pub Date: Nov. 5, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-4197-3903-3
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Amulet/Abrams
Review Posted Online: Nov. 18, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
A sympathetic, compelling introduction to wolves from the perspective of one wolf and his memorable journey.
Separated from his pack, Swift, a young wolf, embarks on a perilous search for a new home.
Swift’s mother impresses on him early that his “pack belongs to the mountains and the mountains belong to the pack.” His father teaches him to hunt elk, avoid skunks and porcupines, revere the life that gives them life, and “carry on” when their pack is devastated in an attack by enemy wolves. Alone and grieving, Swift reluctantly leaves his mountain home. Crossing into unfamiliar territory, he’s injured and nearly dies, but the need to run, hunt, and live drives him on. Following a routine of “walk-trot-eat-rest,” Swift traverses prairies, canyons, and deserts, encountering men with rifles, hunger, thirst, highways, wild horses, a cougar, and a forest fire. Never imagining the “world could be so big or that I could be so alone in it,” Swift renames himself Wander as he reaches new mountains and finds a new home. Rife with details of the myriad scents, sounds, tastes, touches, and sights in Swift/Wander’s primal existence, the immediacy of his intimate, first-person, present-tense narration proves deeply moving, especially his longing for companionship. Realistic black-and-white illustrations trace key events in this unique survival story, and extensive backmatter fills in further factual information about wolves and their habitat.
A sympathetic, compelling introduction to wolves from the perspective of one wolf and his memorable journey. (additional resources, map) (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: May 7, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-289593-6
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2019
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