Review of The Dragon's Pearl by Devin Jordan

Jordan, Devin. The Dragon's Pearl. Simon & Schuster, 2009.

Sixteen-year-old Marco Polo (yes, that Marco Polo) has always chafed at having to stay home in safe old Venice while his father and uncle go gallivanting about the globe, so when his uncle comes home from an expedition with the dread news that Marco's father has been captured by creepy half-man/half-animal creatures under the sway of a magician named Arghun, Marco is determined to set off over the Insurmountable Mountains to the Unknown Lands (what we'd call Asia) to rescue him.

Shortly thereafter, Marco's uncle is murdered, cementing Marco's resolve. He and his friend Amelio (the son of a trusted household servant) set off for Constantinople and then, after meeting up with an ally of the Polos, find a guide and set off for the Unknown Lands, where magic is still alive and well and where, despite the power of Kublai Khan, an evil force is threatening to take over.

This book starts out promisingly with a swashbuckling practice sword fight between Marco and Amelio and then a quick and smooth transition from Venice to Constantinople. I do love fast-paced buddy stories in which a pair of friends fall into and haul each other out of all manner of scrapes, and at first this seemed to be such a tale. However, although the pace of the action gallops along, the two friends seem at times to be almost accidental travel companions - not only do the boys remain only sketchily drawn as characters, but they don't interact much and thus their friendship remains somewhat theoretical. Amelio has the potential to be a character along the lines of Harry Potter's friend Ron - but he remains a cipher. Even the cool little imp that adopts him is completely ignored except when the plot needs the creature to get the friends out of a jam.

The exotic setting - an Asia as yet undiscovered by Europeans and seething with magic - has lots of potential, some of which is realized in well-written scenes like the ones in the city of Bukhara, with its hillside location and its enormous marketplace full of intoxicating sights, sounds, and scents. However, the Unknown Lands and their people are left almost completely undescribed, leaving the reader with nothing to visualize except dots on a map. Certainly, no effort was made, other than the character of Kublai Khan and the fact that his daughter has black hair, to make this fantasy Asia bear any resemblance to the real thing. And considering what an amazing place Asia of 1300 was, this is a real pity.

This tale also suffers from some clumsy writing. Awkward sentences like "And when Kokachin refused to remove his headdress, they allowed him to remain consumed by his shrouds" are a bit too common. "Consumed" by his shrouds? Did they have teeth? Arghun, the villainous magician, is a stock character of such complete evil that he is of no interest whatsoever, given to spouting such ludicrous phrases as "I shall possess the wind dragon and all will tremble" and "These are my dragon claws. They're about to feast on your flesh."

And one last quibble - although this wonderful world of ours is composed of men and women, approximately 50% of each, you wouldn't know it from The Dragon's Pearl. There is only one female in the entire book, and she only appears as female at the end (having been in a male disguise before). Yes, books about dudes having adventures are all very well - but there was a bit too much testosterone in this one. I'm hoping the next installment will contain a few more female characters.

I do recommend this book as an adequate fantasy adventure with an unusual slant and enough action to carry readers effortlessly to the finish - just don't expect perfection (except in the compelling jacket art by Jim di Bartolo). For ages 11 to 15.

Review of The Hotel Under the Sand by Kage Baker

Baker, Kage. The Hotel Under the Sand. Tachyon Publications, 2009.

Nine-year-old Emma is blown by a storm (of an uncertain nature) to a legendary island, where she meets a young ghost named Winston. No sooner has Winston told Emma of his job as Bell Captain at the most amazing hotel ever built and of the hotel's tragic burial, just before its opening day, under the sand during a huge storm more than 100 years ago (which brought about Winston's death as well), than another storm blows away all the sand and reveals the Grand Wenlocke in all its glory.

The Grand Wenlocke was built by a most unusual and enterprising gentleman, and its most amazing innovation is a device that allows time in and around the hotel to stand still, so that its guests can take as long a vacation as they want and no time will have passed in the outside world. This magical technology means that the hotel, and its sole occupant, the cook Mrs. Beet, are entirely preserved in pristine condition. Emma, Winston, and Mrs. Beet are eventually joined by a pirate and the last remaining scion of the Wenlocke family - together they open the hotel to a throng of highly unusual and magical guests.

The calm and even tone of the narration makes this story feel timeless - although the reader knows that Emma is a fairly modern girl and that Winston lived in the time of telegraphs and cinematographs and phonograph cylinders, the weird and magical isolation of the hotel really does manage to make one's era feel meaningless. This gives the book an old-fashioned feeling with a slightly quirky edge to it.

There isn't much plot, most of the story centering around discovering the wonders of the hotel, finding its treasure (a fun sort of quest in itself), and getting it up and running. Although we hear a bit about the prior lives of most characters, Emma remains an enigma. We know only that she is the sole survivor of a terrible storm that wiped away everyone and everything in her life forever, and while she isn't one to mope, this gives the girl a tinge of sadness that only shows up sometimes. It's also a bit distancing - we don't get to know Emma well, and the other characters are quaint and even appealing but not quite real.

What I found most appealing was the idea of a place quite separate from the rest of the world. Like the Titanic, it is perfectly preserved in a grand moment of time, and everything connected with it is exotic and otherworldly. Who wouldn't want to escape and spend some time in an elegant hotel on a tropical beach, where the food is first-rate and all eccentricities are looked upon benignly? And of course you can stay as long as you want, because time stands still in the hotel. I can only imagine that this idea would be almost as enticing to a young reader as it is to me.

More troubling, there is one of those time-related conundrums that I can't seem to wrap my head around. The big gimmick of the Grand Wenlocke is that you can stay as long as you want "but when you left, only a weekend would have passed in the outside world," as Winston explains to Emma. So then - how could the Grand Wenlocke, not to mention Mrs. Beet, be perfectly preserved after 100 years have gone by in the outside world? I would think that if time had slowed down in the hotel, thousands of years might have gone by in there. I suppose we're supposed to assume that time is actually non-existent in the Grand Wenlocke or exists on a whole different plane. Still, it doesn't feel logical. But maybe my brain is just too noodley to understand space/time continuum-type concepts.

This fantasy will not appeal to kids who want lots of action or even lots of magic; give it to kids who enjoy the gently humorous fantasies of Eva Ibbotson. I think it would also make a rather unorthodox but strangely compelling read-aloud. Recommended for contemplative kids ages 8 to 11.

What I've been doing instead of blogging

I've fallen behind on writing posts lately, but that's only because I've been keeping busy with:

Work! Yep, that's 40 hours (plus 7.5 hours commuting time) per week, not leaving much time left over for blogging. And those breaks, so handy for dashing off a quickie blog post, are usually used for getting more caffeine into my system these days.

Cybils! Oh, I am SO behind in my reading - so I feel lashed by guilt every time I sit down with my little netbook instead of a nominated middle-grade fantasy or SF book. I'm not sure this is much of an excuse, however. My co-panelist Charlotte has not only managed to read most of the nominated books, but she has been posting up a storm, including a weekly round-up of fantasy and SF reviews from all over the blogosphere.

Running! The 2010 LA Marathon is looming...

Crafting! The only thing that keeps me from melting into a little puddle of guilt while watching Netflix movies (when I should be reading!!!) is working on my creatures (photo above). It's for a good cause - I'm donating them to my library system's Nettie Frishman fundraiser, which raises money for children's librarians' staff development workshops. But will anyone buy them? Fear of rejection clutches at my heart, as well as the guilty hope that I'll be able to take my creatures all home again where they belong.

It's so convenient that even my excuses for not posting can become fodder for a post...

Fun with String (and handkerchiefs and paper)

The twenty or so grown women (and one man) who attended Anne Pellowski's storytelling workshop at UCLA last Friday went through several moments of feeling about eight years old as we tangled string around our fingers, folded up paper, and tried to turn handkerchiefs into bunnies and babies rather then grubby wads.

Between our bumbling but oh-so-satisfying attempts to tell stories with these objects, Anne told stories using Matrushka dolls, pencil and paper, felt figures, an mbira, and even vegetables (a tale from Japan that relates all the excuses various fruits and veggies have for not visiting poor, sick Tofu in the hospital). She also showed us Indonesian scroll stories, Kamishibi story sets from Japan, Indian story cloths, and palm leaf picture books.*

What is so enticing about the stories Anne taught us is that the combination of simple story and prop creates a magic that is almost mystifying. You should have heard us gasp when Anne created a mosquito out of a piece of string and then swatted it out of existence or when a handkerchief became two babies rocking in a cradle. And when we had learned (rather laboriously - we were not quick studies, I have to say) to do it ourselves, I think we all wanted to jump right up and go show someone our new trick.

My mother, who started out as a children's librarian herself, told me plenty of stories when I was a child, and I remember the exact day I began telling stories in earnest to my own kids, during a long walk in Yosemite when my older daughter Vivian was 2 years old and I wanted to keep her mind off her tired feet. We started with Little Red Riding Hood and went through every story I could think of until we arrived back at the lodge. That was excellent practice for telling stories at storytime, at family programs, and during visits to classrooms, and to this day, I practice telling stories to my younger daughter, who is now 15 but has always been an avid audience.

I'll be teaching Storytelling at UCLA's library school next spring - I can't wait to teach my students to make mosquitos and bunnies!

*To find these stories and more, check out the following books by Anne Pellowski:

Drawing Stories from around the World

Folktales and Folklore from Poland

Story Vine

A World of Children's Stories

Storytelling Handbook for Young People

Review of Dreamdark: Silksinger by Laini Taylor

Taylor, Laini. Dreamdark: Silksinger. Putnam's Sons, 2009.

I reviewed the first book in the Dreamdark series (Dreamdark: Blackbringer) for School Library Journal, and while I gave it a good review, it did not for some reason win me over completely. Was it the book itself? Was it my mood? Had I read too many faery book recently?

Whatever the case, I approached Silksinger with some trepidation. Everyone else has been raving about it - what if I disliked it? I'd have to question my own reaction to books - am I too picky? Too discerning? Simply too cranky?

What a relief - Silksinger is a winner! Magpie Windwitch is, along with her friend Talon and her band of crow brothers, off on her quest to gather up all the Djinn - and it so happens that one of them, Azazel, is in the fierce possession of tiny Whisper, last of the Silksinger faeries. She's being pursued by devils who want it for their nasty devil master Ethiag, but his badness pales in comparison to Ethiag's own master, who plans to take over the world.

Magpie is as spunky and fearless as ever, and her relationship with Talon has an interesting tinge of complication to it. Willow, who has lost her entire clan and has nothing but her oath to protect Azazel to keep her going, finds an ally in Hirik, whose loyal and brave heart belies the stories of betrayal that taint his clan. Both Hirik and Willow are fascinating characters whose passion and desperation are so strong and believable that readers will immediately feel that they've known them forever. Even minor characters receive the kind of writerly attention to detail that makes them memorable - Slomby in particular, a lowly slave who resembles a snail, is quite winning. The city itself is a kind of character, with its bazaars and neighborhoods full of sights and sounds.

Simply put, this story sucked me in and kept me immersed in an exotic world of faeries, hobgoblins, imps, firedrakes, and devils. Any book that makes me forget that I'm a Grown-up Who Reviews Books gets high marks from me, and this one managed that feat. Perhaps I'll have to go back and give Dreamdark: Blackbringer another try...

Recommended for all fantasy fans ages 10 to 14.

Review of Ottoline Goes to School by Chris Riddell

Riddell, Chris. Ottoline Goes to School. Harper, c2008.

Poor Mr. Munroe. His status in Ottoline's life is rather unique - and rather unclear to outsiders. In fact, most folks can't quite tell what manner of creature he is, and so when he accompanies Ottoline to boarding school (the Alice B. Smith School for the Differently Gifted), he is labeled a dog and sent to stay in the east wing with the other assorted pets and companions (all of whom are at least as eccentric as Mr. Munroe).

This isn't Mr. Munroe's only dilemma. He is also suffering pangs of jealousy and sadness brought about by Ottoline's new friendship with Cecily Forbes-Lawrence III, a girl with rich but often absent parents (not unlike Ottoline herself, but they react to their similar situations rather differently). It is Cecily's attendance at the Alice B. Smith School that prompts Ottoline to enroll as well - and it's a good thing Mr. Munroe goes along, because he helps solve the mystery of a marauding ghost at the school.

I do love Mr. Munroe. He's not supposed to be the star of this book (it's not called Mr. Munroe Goes to School, after all), but his appearance is so odd (he's pretty much all long hair and feet, with a couple of large eyeballs peering through the mop that Ottoline loves to brush for him), his origins so mysterious ("Norway"), and his personality such a lovely blend of moroseness, optimism, and loyalty that he altogether steals the show as far as I'm concerned. Oh, Ottoline is a trooper, with her penchant for wearing different shoes on the same feet and absolutely making the best of her strange life living alone (well, except for Mr. Munroe and a bunch of helpers) in an apartment while her parents travel the world collecting stuff. But that Mr. Munroe...

Light on text and and liberally sprinkled with Riddell's intricate and piquant drawings, this airy, funny book will work well with readers ready for their first chapter books and as a one-on-one read-aloud. And here's a secret - my 15-year-old daughter is simply mad about the Ottoline books, so I know this one spans a great many grade levels. Cheerful, weird, and sweet. Recommended for ages 7 to, er, 15.

Here's a video of Chris Riddell drawing Mr. Munroe...

Review of The Last Olympian by Rick Riordan

Riordan, Rick. The Last Olympian ("The Olympians" book 5). Disney Hyperion, 2009.

As devout readers of this series know, uber-Titan Kronos has been gaining strength and gathering a growing army of Titans and monsters in order to topple the Olympian Gods once and for all. As it is merely days until half-blood Percy Jackson's 16th birthday, the dreaded prophecy, and Percy's role in it, is about to be revealed. As monsters and Titans rage across the United States and in Poseidon's domain, Percy and his half-blood comrades rally their allies for one last stand against their enemy in New York City.

As the last in the series, many secrets and revelations are finally unveiled, making the matter of reviewing the book a delicate proposition. Therefore, I will keep it short and sweet. The yawn-inducing trope of The Final Battle aside, this installment is as exciting and funny as any of the previous books. Grover rallies his nature spirits (and eats a bit of expensive antique furniture), Annabeth kicks butt and takes names, and Percy demonstrates some awesome leadership skills. The bad guys remain mostly venomous cliches, but some of the Gods - Hades in particular - take on added depth that is most surprising and satisfying. Percy has some choices to make, although the arguably hardest one - which girl to choose, Annabeth or Rachel? - is conveniently taken out of his hands, the lucky boy. The battle is fierce and there are some deaths - but they are mostly very much glossed over and take little emotional toll, especially since the denouement is so happy and satisfying. Although readers may take issue with one of Percy's big choices, they will be content to know that in the future, demigods will have much less of a tough row to hoe thanks to Percy.

And the best news of all? Another Camp Half-blood series is still to come! Or so Riordan promises in the acknowledgments. Woo-hoo!

Essential for all fans of the series. Grades 4 to 10.