The Enchanted Bridge (Dragons in a Bag #4), by Zetta Elliott

The Enchanted Bridge (Dragons in a Bag #4), by Zetta Elliott (January 2023, Random House Books for Young Readers), sends Jaxon and his friends the magical other world of Palmara, where they must convince its magical guardian to reopen the link back to our world, so that the magical creatures rescued and sent to Palmara in the previous books can return if they wish too.  They must also convince the guardian to help end a magical sleeping sickness that is afflicting the real world people.  On top of that, Jaxon also needs to find and rescue his grandfather.  

This is a lot for a group of middle school kids.  But the stakes quickly get higher, when the kids realized the guardian's brother is unleashing an even more catastrophic danger that could consume both worlds. 

Jazon and his friends are all discovering their own magical powers, but can they learn to use them to their full potential in time?

It's an exciting portal fantasy, full of strange and creative adventures.  Those who have read the first three books, and appreciated the chance to read real world urban fantasy staring kids of color might be disappointed by the direction the series has taken, but I loved it!  The high stakes and challenges (both the in your face kind, and more philosophical conundrums) faced by the kids make for great reading! 

I subject this book to a rather unhappy morning getting my car fixed, and it passed with flying colors! If you like magical adventures in which friendship and mutual support is just as important as wild powers, you'll love it too, and join me in eager anticipation of the next installment.

nb:  The Enchanted Bridge is eligible for the upcoming cycle of the Cybils Awards!  Nominations open in October...and in the meantime, maybe you'd like to be one of the panelists who get to read and discuss all the nominated elementary/middle grade speculative fiction books to pick the shortlist of seven in the first round, or pick the one winner in the second round?  This year the Cybils is having an early call for panelists, so that the summer can provide a head start for the reading and discussing part.  The deadline for applying is June 14--read more here!

Elf Dog and Owl Head, by M. T. Anderson

Elf Dog and Owl Head, by M. T. Anderson, illustrated by Junyi Wu (April 11, 2023, Candlewick), is a truly delightful middle grade fantasy, especially for those who love dogs (but even cat lovers, like me, will still appreciate the titular dog lots!)

When we first meet this elf dog, she is part of the wyrm hunting pack of the Queen Under the Mountains.  A particularly cunning wyrm (a dragonish creature) leads the hunt out from under the mountains, into our world, and she doesn't make it back underground.  And then she meets a human boy, Clay.

Clay and his family are stuck at home during a global plague, and we know what that's like.  Clay and his sisters have to share one computer for school (not going well), and can't see their friends.  They are driving each other (and their parents) batty, and money is tight.  When Clay meets the elf hound in the woods, he is thrilled to find in her a friend and companion.  And after doing the responsible lost dog (with distinctive pointed red ears) efforts, his parents agree that Elphinore can stay (and isn't that a perfect elf dog name?).

Walks through the woods with Elphinore become magical, as she leads Clay through the boundaries of the other world.  A visit to the village of owl headed folk (who don't welcome human visitors) leads to a friendship with an owl head boy, and Clay's summer gets even better.  

But the fact remains that Elphinore is an elf dog, and Clay has taken possession of her, a dangerous thing.  The Queen wants her back.  The wyrm still prowls. And tensions and worries build at home.  The ending is a little bittersweet, but wraps up everything well, and, for those who are worrying, Elphinore and Clay get their happy ending of boy and dog together.

It is a really good story, with the real world and the fantasy balanced beautifully.  The characters and relationships are rock solidly constructed, and the places appeared in glorious technicolor, as it were, in my mind's eye.  I especially was pleased, in one memorable scene of a nighttime magical revelry, to be reminded of my favorite bit of Moominland Midwinter, which doesn't often happen; probably not the author's intention, but it made me happy.

I bet this would make a great read aloud; I'd have had a great time reading it to mine when they were nine or so.

disclaimer: review copy received from the publisher, and though the illustrations in my copy weren't final, they were still very effective, and I must remember to get ahold of a finished copy so I can appreciate them fully!

Ripped Away, by Shirley Reva Vernick, for Timeslip Tuesday

Ripped Away, by Shirley Reva Vernick (February 2022, Fitzroy Books) is a great upper middle grade time travel book, perhaps even my favorite time travel book of the year so far.

Abe Pearlman is a lonely kid with a head full of stories and no friends.  He has a huge crush on Mitzy, whose also something of a loner, but can't manage to say hi to her.  On his way home from school one day, he sees a sign for a fortune teller, and unexpectedly finds himself curious enough to go inside.  The fortune teller asks him what he most wishes for, and he tells her he wants to be a more interesting person.  She then tells him  that someone is going to die, but that he can save that person.  And then he blacks out.

He comes too in a horse drawn wagon in Victorian London.  He is now Asher, who works for a jewelry peddler, and lives in a tenement with his impoverished mother.  All of Asher's life is there in his head.  Understandably, he is freaked out, and figures that maybe saving the life the fortune teller mentioned is his way home.  And then Jack the Ripper murders a woman just steps away from where he is standing with the horse and cart....

Back in the tenement, Abe finds that Mitzy has also travelled back in time...she too went to have her fortune told, and now she is a blind girl, Maya, his upstairs neighbor living with her mother and her uncle, a butcher.   Both kids are from Jewish immigrant families, and this is a bad time to be Jewish in London.

The city is roiled by the Ripper killings, and  Jews are being targeted as suspects.   Antisemitism is rampant.  The police are looking in Jewish homes for the knife used in the killings, and when Mitzy's uncle won't produce his butcher knives, he is arrested and considered guilty.  Abe sees this as a  chance to save a life, and is able to get the uncle to tell him where his knives are, and why he hidden them.  But Mitzy's way home is still unclear, and the longer the two kids stay in the past, the stronger the lives of Asher and Maya are becoming, starting to subsume their own identities....

The time travel plot (which gets very tense!) and the murders (off stage, but also tense) set up a gripping framework for the excellent character-driven story.  The friendship/nascent romance developing between the two kids is heart-warming, and although Mitzy has little agency (though she does bring her intelligence to bear on the situation), Abe demonstrates pleasing initiative and intelligence.  The sensory details and descriptions really transport the reader back in time as well, without slowing down the story.  It is a short book, only 118 pages, but it gets everything done nicely. There are very few Jewish time-travel books for kids, and so it's great to have this one, with its top notch cultural and historical details. 

disclaimer--review copy received for Cybils Awards judging.

Water, Water, by Cary Fagan, illustrated by Jon McNaught

Water, Water, by Cary Fagan, illustrated by Jon McNaught (March 2022, Tundra Books), arrived this past weekend, my first Cybils Awards review copy.  I was curious about this one, so was very pleased to get a chance to read this dreamlike story of a flooded world, and was not disappointed.   (I am pleased as well that it will be joining the ranks of the Ocean State Libraries' mg spec fic collection, taking its place alongside many other fine books from Cybils of years past....)

Rafe wakes to find his room is floating on a vast ocean, with no land in site.  His room has separated from the rest of the house, and he has no idea what has happened or if his parents (or anyone else in the world, for that matter) are still alive.  He and his dog are all there is.  Things float by, and although the woman playing a chello on her own raft is too far away to be pulled close, Rafe fishes out what he can...Fortunately the flotsam includes cans of food, and Rafe works hard not to think about all his many many questions.   He even finishes his homework.

Gradually the desert island of his room broadens with the arrival of a younger girl, Dao, from Thailand, floating on an air mattress, and life in the room and its roof becomes more companionable. Dao is quick to learn enough English to communicate (Rafe's Thai doesn't get very far, but Dao has the advantage of having watched American tv), and Rafe reads her the one book that was in the room, the story of a girl and a magical rabbit, which gives them a lovely bit of escape from reality.

Though not much Happens (the one Action-y bit it is an attack by teenage pirates, successfully fended off, the dreamlike happenings do move the two kids and the dog towards a more hopeful place (though still a shattered/broken/flooded one). We never find out details of what exactly happened and how widespread the flooding is and all the other climate dystopian details (in fact though it is about global flooding, it didn't strike me as being About climate disaster).  This lack of any context verges on being vexing, but such details would have destroyed the beautifully surreal quality of the story that I appreciated lots.  Read in a single sitting.

Because there are no answers, this isn't one for the kid who wants to know why and how and where.  But for the young daydreamer it would make a lovely gift!

Ravenfall, by Kalyn Josephson

Ravenfall, by Kalyn Josephson (September 6th 2022 by Delacorte Press), was a truly delightful read, reminding me strongly why I really really like middle grade fantasy!  Rather than do my usual plot summary followed by thoughts, here are all the things that made me a happy reader:

The titular Ravenfall, run as a guest house, but primarily a home, is a magical house with tons of personality, always paying attention to its residents.  I love place centered stories, and this delivered!  

It is protected by a guardian jabberwocky, who mostly takes the shape of a cat, who also has tons of personality.

And it is home to a magical family.  Anna is the youngest child, and her gift has just manifested--when she touches someone, she shares their memories of deaths they have witnessed.  I loved how she compares her magic to the various gifts of the rest of the family, and feels disappointed and less than, but grows to realize that it is actually much more of a gift than she thought it was.  Very relatable.

Another kid, Colin, arrives at Ravenfall alone, in terrible trouble.  I loved how he is welcomed and how his grief isn't played down, and is still there even as he finds comfort and a sense of belonging (and his own magic).  

It was great shifting between Anna's insider pov and Colin's newcomer pov; it really made the place, the people and the magic three-dimensional.

And I loved how the central antagonist, and the growing threat he brings to Ravenfall, is huge and awful, but not exaggerated to the point where it seems impossible that the two kids can play a central role in defeating it....

But they are totally and unconditionally not just backed up but directed by all the grown-ups and older sisters, because the kids couldn't have done everything alone.  This made the plot very solid and satisfying to grown-up me. And yet even the grown-ups make mistakes...figuring out what to do requires teamwork, admitting mistakes, 

And finally I liked very much (though this is a smallish thing that the target audience might not appreciate as much as me), is that Anna's mother doesn't actually want to have been stuck running Ravenfall, but does it with good grace.  A nice bit of real world grown-up-ness that was another thing that made everything feel really solid.

Even more finally, I liked (lots) how, after I read the satisfying, closure providing ending, I saw there would be a second book!

So in short, a lovely immersive read that I highly recommend!

Fenris and Mott, by Greg van Eekhout (with interview!)

When my kids were little, we would talk about little baby Fenwis [sic] and how what he really needed was a Mama who loved him very much and gave good scritches....so it was rather delightful to see that flight of fancy come to life in Greg van Eekhout's newest book, Fenris and Mott (August 2, 2022, Harper Collins).

When Mott finds a scared little pup mweeping sadly in a recycling bin, her heart melts...dog's aren't allowed in her new apartment, but she can't just leave him.  But it turns out this isn't a puppy, but a wolf cub, who will need to be taken to live in the wild.  

The cub does not want to be leashed and taken into the wild, breaks free, and starts to bring about Ragnarok, the destruction of the world in Norse mythology.  The little mweeper is in fact Fenris, the fabled wolf who is fated to devour the sun and the moon....

And suddenly Mott's life becomes filled with Norse gods wanting to encourage Fenris, because prophesies are meant to come true. Fenris can't help the fact that the rune of annihilation is in his gut, and starts devouring on a (relatively) small scale--bits of city infrastructure and a famous actor disappear down his bottomless maw....Fortunately Mott and Fenris are found by Trudi, a Valkarie who is Fenris's protector, and the two of them join forces to try to stave off Ragnarok and save little Fenris.

It's an exciting story full of mythological mayhem crashing into the real world, balanced by the more quotidian story of a middle school kid in a new town with an absent father who doesn't' keep his promises and a best friend far away who's moving on without her.  It's also a fable of climate change (things can get plenty bad without a rune of annihilation on the loose) and so is extremely topical. The ending packs a zinger of a punch leaving my mind racing.....(nb-Fenris is fine in the end, and one hopes the moon will survive being slightly gnawed....). It's also sweet and funny and has an adorable puppy, so should be a huge hit with young fans of cute animals!  It's easy to imagine this one getting lots of love from its target audience.

And now it's my pleasure to welcome Greg here to my blog! I've been a fan of his since his very first book for young readers, Kid Vs Squid, which I reviewed back in 2010....

 

How did the idea for Fenris and Mott first come to you?

I thought it'd be fun to write a story about a kid who has to take care of some kind of cute and destructive creature. I didn't know if the creature would be an ordinary pet or an alien or a dinosaur or some kind of genetically modified beast or something else, but that was one of the seeds of an idea I first came up with. 

Was there anything that surprised you in the writing of it?

I didn't know the book was going to be in part about climate change, but you can't write about Ragnarök without writing about extreme weather, and to write about extreme weather without writing about climate change would have been weird and dishonest. 

 

This is your second Ragnorak book, the first being Norse Code, written for adults and published back in 2009.  Very different books, very different audiences….but as you were writing Fenris and Mott, did you have intrusive Norse Code flashbacks?

Not really. Norse Code and Fenris & Mott are such different books that it really wasn't hard to keep them completely separate in my head. Even when they have characters in common, like Loki and Odin and Hermod, they're very different versions of those characters. 

 

Will there be a sequel?  I can’t stop thinking about what Mott might do with her own pocket Ragnorak—nuclear waste cleanup, perhaps…..and will little Fenris be a good domesticated pet?

Oh, I would love to write a sequel! I had so much fun writing Fenris & Mott, and it'd be a blast to visit those characters again. As for Fenris as a pet, he'd be destructive and disruptive and a little bit horrible, just like my dogs!

And finally, what are you working on now?

I'm putting the final touches on a new middle-grade, The Ghost Job. It's about a crew of ghosts who do heists, and it's scheduled to come out next year.

Thank you Greg!  I will now proceed to start looking forward to The Ghost Job!

 

Greg van Eekhout is also the author of Voyage of the Dogs, Cog, and Weird Kid. He lives in San Diego, CA, with his astronomy/physics professor wife and two dogs. He’s worked as an educational software developer, ice cream scooper, part-time college instructor, and telemarketer. Being a writer is the only job he's ever actually liked. You can find more about Greg at his website: www.writingandsnacks.com.

 

Secret of the Shadow Beasts, by Diane Magras

I've read lots and lots of good books so far this year, but this past week, for the first  time in ages, I started one after supper (Secret of the Shadow Beasts, by Diane Magras), and read and read and then had an oh no moment when I realized it was almost midnight (usually I'm safely in bed at ten, and wake up around five thirty) and I hadn't quite finished the book yet....a terrible dilemma.  I finished it though because there really wasn't a choice, but sadly did not quite give the people of Rhode Island, for whom I work, my absolute shiny and alert best the next day.....(happily I have lots to do that isn't rocket science on which lives are depending, so it's ok, and I have no regrets).

This (very good, very gripping) book is set in a world where nightfall brings forth venomous shadow beasts, and everyone with sense huddles inside protected buildings.  The shadow beasts are slower to attack kids and some kids are immune, and these kids are taken from their families when they are little and trained to be beast fighters.  Nora could have been one of them, but her father wouldn't let her be taken. Now he has been killed by a shadow beast, Nora decides for herself that she will put the last few years of her childhood immunity to work keeping other people from the same fate.

And she goes off to get to trained, but there are far too few kids, and far too many shadow beasts, so when she shows unusual aptitude, she's quickly slotted into the Hawks, one of the fighting brigades comprised of handful of children, and sent off on her first two week mission.  Even immune kids can be killed by shadow beasts, if they are attacked enough times, and the Hawks just suffered the loss of one of their crew, Lucy. Nora is taking her place.  The Hawks are also kids taken from their families when they were seven or so, and so they have become a tight knit found family; it takes a while for Nora to be fully part of the group.  So things aren't exactly happy triumphant monster slaying.  

And the number of shadow beasts keeps growing....there's a sinister reason behind it (the titular secret), and Nora and her fellow Hawks might be the only ones able to survive the incredibly dangerous, almost insane, mission to set the balance right again.  (lots of interesting bits of plot here, that I shan't talk about for reasons).

bonus points for:

comfort reading for the characters!  there's one bit where the kids have some down time, and visit a bookstore to load themselves up with escapist material, and I loved seeing the different genres they liked.

an adult who adults!  The Hawks, and other brigades, don't go out alone; there's a grown-up with them to do the driving, help with game plans and emergencies,  and keep morale up. This grown-up, rather disturbingly, also acts as beast bait (kids being less likely to be attacked).  In any event, the Hawks grown-up is a good one, and I was really glad they had him.

trauma that was not splashed all over the place but dealt with in a moving, slow burn sort of way--these kids have been dealt a rotten hand, and are working through tough things, and Nora is something of a catalyst that helps with this.

NB--Secret of the Shadow Beasts (June 14th 2022, Dial Books), is eligible for this years Cybils Awards (in Elementary/Middle Grade speculative fiction).  Starting this Wednesday, the 17th, you can apply to be a panelist on for this category, or one of the others....here's a blog post of mine with more info.

The Tarnished Garden, by Alyssa Colman

 

Here's my Goodreads review for The Tarnished Garden, by Alyssa Colman--"checks lots of my boxes--sisters, a garden, school story, magic, kittens......I enjoyed it very much!"  And indeed though I enjoyed the first book in the series, The Gilded Girl, lots, this was more to my taste, because of it having the garden and magical kittens!

Maeve has been reunited with her big sister, Izzy, after a traumatic stint of being a farmed out orphan out west.  The two are now pupils at a new school for magic in New York city; it is the Gilded Age, but with magic.  But Maeve and Izzy are having trouble reconnecting, Maeve's magic is wild and uncontrolled, there are those who think magic should be the exclusive purview of the privileged (with the sisters are most definitely not), and disaster is striking one magically built building after another, extinguishing the magic holding them together.  And on top of this, house dragons (basically cats with magic) are going missing.  In order to save their school, and the right of poor kids to spark their magic and learn to use it, the girls must figure out what is going on and put a stop to it.

So that's a fine plot, but what I really loved was how Maeve finds a secret magical garden, and makes it grow and come alive again with her magic, learning how to use just as much as she needs without it getting carried away.  And in the garden there are three little house dragon kittens, who are adorable, who's mother left them there under magical protection.....and a boy shut up in an apartment overlooking it, who's mother won't let him out lest he gains magic too.

A really delightful story, with the charming magic given weight by the sibling relationship and by the inequality of the society in which they live.  My enjoyment was heighted by my familiarity with The Secret Garden--there were lots of echoes that I loved.

The Last Mapmaker, by Christina Soontornvat

The Last Mapmaker, by Christina Soontornvat (middle grade, April 12, 2022, Candlewick), tells of a fascinating voyage of discovery, with pleasing twists, a great heroine, lots of lovely mapmaking for those of us who like to read about work being done, and even dragons!

In a Thai-inspired reimaging of South East Asia, twelve-year-old Sai is determined to escape the poverty and miserable living conditions of the Fens.  She only has a year to save up enough money to make a new life for herself the kingdom of Mangkon, because only those who are given golden lineal beads (that show off their ancestry) when they turn thirteen are respected members of society.  She's managed to get work as an assistant to Paivoon, a famous mapmaker, and allows herself to hope she can make a future for herself, despite her lack of ancestors..

Then the Queen of Mangkon and all of its conquered territories decides to launch expeditions in all directions seeking new lands to add to the empire's glory.  Paivoon is chosen to be the mapmaker on board the ship headed south under the command of the woman who is one of the most famous war heroes in the kingdom.  But Paivoon has started to suffer from tremors, and can no longer trust his hands to write and draw clearly, so he offers Sai a place on the voyage to serve as his scribe.

After miserable sea sickness, Sai takes a keen interest in the voyage that takes her past new islands that are new to her and then off into uncharted waters.  The crew hopes to find the fabled southern continent of Sunderland (there's a lucrative prize if they do),  and Sai certainly would like that too.  But she can't convince Paivoon to take Sunderland's existence seriously.

Her life on the ship is somewhat complicated by a stowaway, an island boy named Bo, who proves important to the story both plot-wise and addition of character interest-wise.  And then her life becomes truly complicated by treachery that leads to her and Bo being castaway on their own, and then finding Sunderland.  And meeting dragons....(although to those who want lots of DRAGON, it's not a great feast of dragon-ness; its more like a soupçon of  dragon, that adds welcome fantasy spice and contributes to the central tension of the book very nicely).

What I liked lots--

The mapmaking.  Paivoon doesn't rely on the corpus of official maps, but takes seriously scraps of knowledge from fishermen, conveyed in their tales and rough drawings on scraps of cloth.  

Related to mapmaking, Paivonn teaches Sai that "discovering unknown lands" is a somewhat meaningless concept, because official voyages of discovery are by no means the first time people have ever reached place.  I especially appreciated how he leads her to understand that official claims to "newly discovered" places often leads to their exploitation (though it's not stated nearly so baldly in the book, so no need to worry about heavy-handed Messaging), and how at the end of the story the final map we see Sai make uses names to try to keep the Sunderland, and its dragon family, safe (at least for a little while).  I love it when words have power!

I loved Sai and Paivoon's teacher/student relationship more generally, and how Sai ends the story by passing on the opportunity she was given to another poor kid. 

I liked the pacing of the story...the time taken to establish the context, the ocean voyage in which very little that's Exciting happens, but much is learned.  (I have reservations about this in terms of young readers liking the book though--it won't be for every kid. I think the cover does a great job conveying the feel of the story--any reader drawn to that image will probably enjoy the book.)

And being a sucker for survival stories, I like the bit where Sai and Bo are stranded on a miserable island, and struggle to survive and escape.

To summarize:  I liked the book lots!  

disclaimer: review copy received from the publisher

The Mirrorwood, by Deva Fagan, for Timeslip Tuesday

Happy book birthday to the lovely middle grade fantasy, The Mirrorwood (April 12, 2022,  Atheneum Books for Young Readers), by Deva Fagan! What with all the new mg fantasy books this week, and the scramble to get reviews up, I was worried that Timeslip Tuesday would interfere with my plans....happily The Mirrorwood has enough timeslip in it that I can in good conscience count it as today's offering!

Fable's family lives near the impassibly thorny border separating the Mirrorwood, full of dangerous blight magic, from the safe, ordinary world. But blight still gets through, twisting whatever it touches into something impossible. And Fable was touched by it when she was born. She has no face of her own, but must borrow other's faces.... wearing them until they start fading into featureless gray, taking her life force with them. Her family loves her, and share their faces, but she can't go far from their farm, because those who are blighted are feared, and even hunted and killed.

And when a father/daughter blight hunter team sets their sights on her, the only way to escape is to try to get through the thorns into the Mirrorwood, where she had been heading to try to find a way to free herself of her curse. She's accompanied by the daughter, Vycorax, who hadn't been able to killer despite her father's orders. The two girls agree to truce as they set off to explore the world beyond the thorns.

There they find a world lost in a spell, cast by one of the Subtle Powers, the twisty immortals who can grant wishes, or make bargains that could snare the unwary. The people of the Mirrorwood have been trapped in a time loop; every day time resets and they live the day again for the first time. The only people who know of this trap are those who have themselves, like Fable, been blighted. They can see the horrible reality.... but can't do anything to fix it.

Fable and Vycorax are found by one of the Subtle Powers, the wish granter, who tells them how the Mirrorwood came to be cursed. The true prince has been caught by the time warp, and a blighted demon imposter has taken his place. If the demon is killed, the curse will be lifted, but it is an almost impossible task. Which the girls, in true mg fantasy form, set off to undertake regardless.... there really isn't a choice. Fable has made a wish of her own, as well--that she could have her own true face.

And this is where things really get interesting! Not only are the girls moving from enemies to loyal friends, but there's a twist to the whole demon prince thing.... the curse isn't exactly what the Subtle Power told them it was. Lyrian, the demon prince, proves to be a much more complex character than the girls had anticipated...

And also at this point is where I stopped just happily reading along, enjoying the story, and became grimly determined to read faster and faster so that I could see what would happen next! Twists and turns, new characters to meet and learn to care about, depth to the story and more about the darkness that preceded the curse, more impossible questing, riddle and illusions, alongside growth in Fable's character.

There's also an increase in the tension of the time warp; it's concentrated inside the castle, where instead of a day, those at the heart of the curse have only seconds of life repeating endlessly, those just outside have minutes or hours, not necessarily nice ones (one bit of this was immensely powerful, driving home the horror of what had happened.

It's clearly a riff on Sleeping Beauty, and it will please fans of reworked fairy tales just fine, but it's more than a reimagining; it's its own thing.  A lovely, gripping thing, with a strong message that it's what's inside that really counts.  Fable realizes that she is still her true self, no matter what her face is, and Vycorax learns that she can make her own choices, and not be bound to her single-minded killer of a father.  People who look like monsters aren't necessarily bad, and the converse as well.  

And as an added bonus, Fable's lovely cat, with whom she can speak, is along for the ride as well! 

The ending is satisfactory, making this a stand-alone, but I'd love to return to the Mirrorwood for more. Partly because it's such a wonderfully strange place, and partly because I'd like to see if the glimmerings of attraction between Fable and Vycorax, and a little between Fable and Lyrian, come to anything....I can't decide which I'd prefer!

short answer: I truly enjoyed it!

disclaimer: review copy received from the author, and deposited by the delivery person in shrubbery next to a door I don't use, so I was very glad I found it safely after who knows how long!

Welcome to Dweeb Club, by Betsy Uhrig, for Timeslip Tuesday

Trying to change the past is often the goal of time travelers, whether it's killing Hitler, or making sure to be in the right place at the right time to meet the right person. Betsy Uhrig has come up with a fresh twist to this type of story in Welcome To Dweeb Club, (September 2021, Margaret K. McElderry Books) that's a fun story of a bunch of 7th graders who find themselves the ones being visited by the future....

At the start of seventh grade, Jason and his friend Steve are confronted with bewildering fair of clubs they could join.  Amongst the panoply and promotion is one odd club, H.A.I.R. There's no description, nothing to try to make it alluring; there's just a piece of paper on which no one has signed their name.  Jason and Steve seize the chance to be founding members....and when other kids see Glamorous Steve, as he's known, signing up, they do to.

So H.A.I.R. ends up with with 8 seventh graders, who are surprised to learn that the club will be in charge of monitoring the school's ritzy new security cameras (donated with the stipulation that H.A.I.R be created for this purpose).  The kids are a mixed lot, but all are eager to mess with their new tech, and they are given a tiny room down in the basement, and start going through the security footage.

The footage proves more interesting then they could have guessed.  They see themselves in the school cafeteria, five years in the future!  None of them are happy about what they see.

And so they set themselves to figuring out what's going on, determined to change the future.  In the processes there's social tension the way only 7th grade can be social tense,  quite a few bits that made me chuckle, and many more that made me grin, some mayhem, and a very affectionate skunk....and the outcome is just what the instigator of the whole shebang would have wanted (or will be wanting, and will be inspired to set in motion....).  

It's a quick and entertaining read, and it might inspire a few of the target audience to introspection about what they might change about themselves (one character, for instance, decides to embrace her inner nerd, another starts working on being less self-centered, etc.; the sort of things that are useful nudges for many 7th graders.).    If you are looking for an oddball, funny sci-book with middle grade angst (and a skunk), this is a good pick! 

(Oddball and quirky is not own personal favorite sort of sci fi, and I don't like being made to think of all the things I'd like future me to have nudged me to change, but despite that I enjoyed it quite a bit!)

Flood City, by Daniel José Older

Flood City, by Daniel José Older (Scholastic, middle grade, February 2, 2021), is a wild, and (I say this after much careful consideration) rambunctious science fi fantasy that entertained me greatly!

Flood City is the last bastion of humanity on Earth.  Epic floods have covered all of the planet except for this raggedy conglomeration mostly made up of old buildings.  Off in space are the Chemical Barons, a powerful force (responsible for the floods in the first place) that wants to return to Earth by taking over Flood City.  The intergalactic Star Guard is protecting, and feeding, the Flood City folk, but it's the sort of protection that's essentially a totalitarian government (and the food tastes like wet towels).  The Chemical Barons are white, the Flood City folk various shades of brown.

Max's Mom was a kid when the floods hit, on a school trip in space.  But the flooded ruins are all Max has ever known.  He and his big sister know all its nooks and cranies, except for the parts where no one ventures (the electric ghost graveyard, and the ocean liner that's home to the mysterious Vapors).  Ato, a young Chemical Baron who's part of what's ostensibly an information gathering mission to Flood City, has only known life in space.

When Ato finds there's a nuclear warhead on board his ship, ready to be dropped on Flood City, he can't stand the thought of the resulting death and destruction, and sabotages the mission.  Surviving the crash landing, he's found by Max, and the two boys form an alliance to keep the other surviving Chemical Barons and their increasingly crazed leader from recovering, and using, the warhead.  Joining them is the daughter of the city's holographer, Djinna, who's mad drumming skills are matched by her technical abilities.  Yala, meanwhile, has joined the Star Gaurd, and is off in space, struggling to survive the hostile environment of her training (human recruits are not treated well at all).

And, skipping to the end,  the four kids (with some help from grownups and a friendly alien) save the day after much action and adventure and tension! The reign of the Star Guard is ended, the Chemical Barons are foiled (for the moment....)

I must confess I was confused as heck at first.  And I will further confess that there are lots of things that aren't explained (like the one magical bird that can carry messages from Earth to Space).  But when I realized that this wasn't a straight up sci fi future environmental apocalypse story, but rather a zesty mix of sci fi and fantasy of the rollicking sort, I relaxed and went along for the ride.  There are magical things alongside jet propulsion boots and space travel, and the reader must just nod in agreement.  I was nodding my head off by the end of the book, because of enjoying it so much!  (Although when I reached the end, I wanted very much to have someone else on hand who had also reached the end to talk too; I still have several "but what about xyz" sort of questions.....).

So there's a lot that's strange, but also a lot that's relatable even for kids living mundane lives, such as Max's crush on Djinna and his desire to break free of the boring sameness of music as proscribed by Star Guard (he's a trumpet player).  Seeing Ato and Max being able to work together after being on different sides, and Ato being able to rethink the stories he's grown up with, is also applicable to our own lives.

My personal favorite part of the book was the regular inclusion of the daily Flood City Gazette.  Though this Star Guard publication annoys the citizens (one of the first things they do when Star Guard pulls out, leaving them (maybe) to starve to death, is figure out how to get rid of the caps lock in which it is printed), I loved it, and always looked forward to the "Iguangull Ahoy!" section in particular. It amused me very much. (Yes there are iguana/gull hybrids with savage beaks and claws that can cut through metal flying around... ).

Strongly recommended to readers who have a tolerance for the somewhat complicated peculiar! (Star Wars fans, for instance, might well enjoy it lots).  That being said, this isn't how I think of myself, and yet I enjoyed it lots....so who knows?

disclaimer: review copy received from the publisher.