Genre: Fantasy

Dragonbreath: Nightmare of the Iguana

Horrifying dream monsters are keeping Wendell awake. In an attempt to help his friend, Danny Dragonbreath and Suki the Salamander go in search of advice from Danny’s wise mythological great-grandfather Dragonbreath. Danny and Suki must defeat the Dream Wasp before it can lay eggs in Wendell’s dreams, which would cause Wendell to go crazy. So Danny, Suki, and a sleepy dream eater enter the “dark horrors of Wendell’s subconscious.” They climb mounds of healthy food, run from a school bully, and search a massive library before they find the Dream Wasp and smash her eggs.

Nightmare of the Iguana is hilarious, action-packed, fun. Wendell’s dreams are the frightening things that kids can relate to—not doing well on a pop quiz, a mother who is a health food nut, and a girl finding out that he likes her. Danny’s wise mythological great-grandfather Dragonbreath’s hearing problems lead to humorous statements. As Danny and Suki enter Wendell’s subconscious and fight dream monsters, the battles involve more running than actual fighting.

Green and black illustrations add to the allure of the book. Drawing with dialogue balloons helps break up the text and keep the action moving. Dragonbreath shows the value of friendship and will get even the most reluctant readers engaged in the story. Although Night of the Iguana is the eighth book of the Dragonbreath series, the story can be enjoyed as a stand-alone story.

Sexual Content

  • Suki kisses Wendell on the cheek.

Violence

  • Monsters chase Danny and Suki, yelling “We will crush their bones and then give them pop quizzes!” They hide in the library, and when a monster finds them, “the monster with the battle-ax swung and hit the weakened bookcase. It collapsed slowly. Books slid off in a waterfall of paper.” They find a staircase in a book and are able to escape unharmed.
  • The dream eater (baku)  fights the Dream Wasp. “The floor shook as the two collided. The Wasp slashed with its bladed forearms, but the baku’s hide was thick and knobby . . .” Danny and Suki began throwing it’s eggs at the Wasp. The battle is described over a chapter and with the dream eater killing the Wasp.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • When being chased by monsters, Suki says, “Oh, crud.”
  • While squishing the Wasp’s eggs, Suki says, “Oh god, this is disgusting.”

Supernatural

  • Danny and Suki enter Wendell’s dream world and see the “dark horrors of Wendell’s subconscious.”
  • Dream monsters enter Wendell’s dreams. The main one, the Dream Wasp, lays its eggs in Wendell’s mind. “The Dream Wasp was the size of a house . . . Its stinger was as long as a car and tapered to a wickedly sharp point. Its jaws were serrated and meshed together like a bone zipper. Its forelegs looked like steak knives, assuming that by ‘steak’ you meant ‘the entire cow.’”

Spiritual Content

  • Danny’s great-grandfather is helping Suki. “He’s teaching me meditative techniques. To help with being a ninja in a past life.”

 

Have Sword, Will Travel

Odo never dreamed of leaving his small town. His best friend, Eleanor, longs for adventure. Everything changes for the two of them when Odo pulls an enchanted sword, Biter, from the river.

Even though Odo doesn’t want adventure, Biter knights him and demands that Odo go on a quest to discover why the town’s river has dried up. Eleanor goes along, excited for the chance to explore the unknown. Along the way, Odo and Eleanor discover that life outside of their village is full of both good and evil and that danger often lurks in unexpected places.

A fast-paced story full of interesting characters—human and non-human— Have Sword, Will Travel takes the reader on an epic adventure. Eleanor is a feisty heroine and Odo is a reluctant hero that children will love. Written with humor, the story teaches lessons such as not bending the truth, fighting for what is right, and defending those in need.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • When two boys make fun of Odo, the sword attempts to attack them. The sword slices “a figure-eight through the air despite Odo’s efforts to keep him grounded.” Odo manages to stop the sword, and the boys run off.
  • Odo must fight Fyrennian, a cruel smith. When Biter attempts to kill Fyrennian, Odo “managed to pull back on the sword at the last moment, deflecting the sword from a killing thrust.”
  • Eleanor is corned by a huge dog. She flings hot coals on the floor, trapping the dog.
  • Someone hits Fyrennian on the head, and “the smith toppled forward like a stone.”
  • A refugee tells a story about “corpses drifting down the river, the bodies of people cooked to death in boiling water.”
  • Sir Saskia challenges Odo to a duel to keep the citizens entertained. The battle is described over several pages. Odo is outmatched, and Sir Saskia strikes Odo’s shoulder twice. “His shoulder felt like it was swelling up inside the armor.” She hits Odo in the same spot a third time, “on his shoulder again, jarring it so much he lost feeling all the way down his arm. His nerveless fingers could no longer hold the sword, and the grip on his left hand was too weak.” Odo is forced to yield.
  • A dragon attacks Odo and Eleanor. Odo strikes the dragon. “The blade scored a vivid line in the blackened hide, exposing softer bone-white flesh beneath . . . he stabbed forward and pierced one wing right up to the cross-guard.” An older woman comes and helps the children escape.
  • A group of Sir Saskia’s troops attacks Eleanor. A person trips and “impaled himself” on the sword. In the end, there is, “one wounded, one dying . . . maybe . . . and one surrendered.”
  • Odo and Eleanor blow up a dam that has been built to stop the river from flowing. When they do, Odo almost drowns. “Odo lay weakly on his stomach, coughing up dirty water while Eleanor pounded his back.”
  • Odo and Eleanor get into a battle with bandits. The battle lasts over several pages. “Biter came down point-first on Mannix’s shoulder, shearing through his armor as if it were no more than river mud. Mannix screamed and swore and clutched at the wound with his left hand, his right arm now useless.” During the fight, Eleanor is kicked with steel-clad boots, and “the pain was like fire.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • At home, Eleanor drinks weak ale because water isn’t always clean.
  • Odo and Eleanor find a group of men passing around mugs. One of the men is telling a story. In the middle of the story he stops, and they see his “eyes suddenly rolling back into his head and his falling backward, unconscious. Fortunately, the arms of his friends were ready to catch him . . .”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Biter, an enchanted sword, is able to talk and control his own movements. He teaches Odo how to wield a sword and act like a knight. Later in the story, the children find Biter’s sister, who believes she is cursed and will bring death to those who wield her.
  • A smith has a firestarter that came from a dragon. He uses it to terrorize others into working for him.
  • A dragon appears to judge several of the characters in the book. The dragon looks at Odo, “really looked at him. He felt her ancient, knowing gaze penetrate into the very depths of his being.” Mannix is found guilty and the “dragon’s tail moved again, whipping around like a scorpion’s, the long spike on the end stabbing Mannix right through the middle and then flipping him back into the dragon’s mouth. It happened so quickly he didn’t even have time to scream.” Another person is cursed and forced to do as the dragon commands.
  • Urthkin, “pale-skinned, reed-slender demi-humans” that have “paws like a mole’s, with digging claws,” only come out at night because light hurts their eyes. They believe that “wisdom comes from closer to the ground.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

Liesl & Po

Liesl’s cruel stepmother keeps her locked away in an attic. With nothing to do, Liesl spends her time looking out a tiny window and drawing. One lonely night, a ghost named Po appears from the Other Side. Both Liesl and Po are less lonely when they are together. When Liesl’s father dies, she is determined to take his ashes to a special place. With Po’s help, Liesl is able to escape and the two embark on a dangerous adventure to bury her father.

The alchemist’s apprentice, Will, leads a miserable life. His one joy is to look at the small girl in the attic window. Late one night, Will accidentally mixes up a major delivery. Now, the person who ordered the most powerful magic in the world will stop at nothing to get her potion that Will failed to send to her.

The lives of the children—Will, Leisl, and Po—intersect as they help each other avoid the adults who would like to capture them.

Lauren Oliver writes a beautiful story that shows the power of friendship. Although Liesl & Po is age-appropriate, the story shows a frightening version of the Other Side—a place where the dead lose their shape and their memories. Another aspect that may frighten younger readers is the terrible actions of the adults in the story. The alchemist verbally abuses Will. Liesl’s stepmother plots the murder of Liesl’s father and attempts to kill Liesl. The other adults (except one) in the story are just as vile. However, the story ends in a satisfying way, leaving the reader with hope.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • One of the alchemist’s apprentices was accidentally turned into a mouse, “just as the alchemist’s scrawny, always hungry tabby cat had come swishing in through the cat door.”
  • Augusta wants to kill her husband and stepdaughter, but she is afraid to kill both at the same time. Therefore, she uses poison to kill her husband because “the slow death of a middle-aged man is hardly likely to be attributed to poison, especially when the poison is administered teaspoon by teaspoon, a bit in the soup every day, over the course of a year.”
  • Will overhears a conversation when a factory worker says, “The problem is the boys. We’re running through ‘em! We’re running out! Boys are losing limbs, fingers, toes. One of the boys had his head chopped off last month.”
  • Someone tries to grab Liesl. “During her frantic struggles against the Lady Premiere, she had smacked her head against the door jam and gone as limp as a lettuce leaf.” Lady Premiere then locks Liesl in a room.
  • Augusta tries to feed Liesl soup that she has poisoned. When Liesl refuses to eat it, “Augusta, enraged, sprang to her feet. She grabbed Liesl by the shoulders and shook her . . . Augusta shook Liesl so hard that her teeth knocked together.” Augusta then tells Liesl she can eat the soup and die slowly or she can starve to death.
  • Two siblings are seen “hopping and twisting and slapping each other.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Po meets a ghost who died in a bar brawl.
  • Augusta kills her husband with poison.
  • Augusta says that her maid was, “dropped on her head quite frequently as a baby. Her mother was a hopeless drunk.”
  • An innkeeper thinks about a time when she served her customers “weak wine.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Po is a ghost who explains how death works. Some people go “straight on,” and others go to the Other Side. The Other Side is “vast and filled with ghosts.” When new people cross over to the “dark and twisting corridors,” people lose their shape and memories. When people first get to the Other Side, “they become a part of darkness, of the vast spaces between starts.”
  • When people die, they blend and become part of the Everything. “The ghost reminded itself that losing form was natural, and good, and the way things were in the universe.”
  • Po takes Liesl to the Other Side. “. . . She was aware of the sensation of Po inside her, urging her forward, like suddenly feeling a division down your middle and being two people . . .” Po leads Liesl through the Other Side, and then opens a passage so Liesl can go back to the living world.
  • When people first get to the Other Side they are often confused because they do not understand where they are. “All those new ghosts: All they wanted was to go back to the Living Side.” In order to help Liesl, Po tells the new ghost to follow him because the path would lead them home. Instead, they go to the Living World. “Because they were very new ghosts, they had not started to blend yet, and so were quite visible. . . Some had holes in their faces, or were missing arms or legs, where their physical selves had begun to dissipate and merge with the rest of the universe.”
  • Liesl’s father returns from the Other Side and accuses his wife, Augusta, of killing him. Augusta then reveals that the alchemist gave her “Pernicious Poison: Dead as a Doorknob, or Your Money Back.”
  • After helping Liesl, Po and Bundle appear as solid shapes. “They were golden—they’d been dipped in gold—no—they were made of gold. And then the golden Po-shape turned into tan brown arms and shoulders, a ring of curly yellow hair, and a laughing smile. . . ” Then he disappeared “to Beyond.”
  • Will works for an alchemist who makes spells. For one spell, Will “spent the whole day grinding up cow eyes, and measuring the blood of lizards into different-sized vials . . .”
  • The alchemist can make spells that “turned frogs into goats and goats into mugs of tea. He made people grow wings or third legs. Recently he had mastered a tincture that would make a person disappear entirely.”

 Spiritual Content

  • None

Pugs of the Frozen North

True Winter comes once in a lifetime. It turns everything into a magical wonderland and gives people an opportunity to win a legendary sled race. Whoever wins can make one wish that will come true.

Two friends, Siska and Shen, embark on a fantastical journey to win the race with sixty-six pugs pulling their sled. Along the way, they encounter many obstacles, including spaghetti-eating yetis, singing snow, and other racers. As they complete the journey, they discover that friendship is more important than winning.

Pugs of the Frozen North is a fun-filled story with outrageous characters, interesting obstacles, and snow that comes to life. Although the story focuses on Siska and Shen, the other characters are extremely funny and help add suspense to the story. The race generates kid-appropriate conflict that will keep the reader guessing and giggling as they watch pugs (and polar bears and dogbots) race to the top of the world.

The story is easy to read and engaging. However, the story doesn’t come to an end when the racers arrive at the top of the world and meet Snowfather. Once the racers reach their destination, the story becomes less interesting and readers may have a difficult time reaching the end of the story. The ending deals with the death of Siska’s grandfather, which may cause some children to have questions about what happens at the end of one’s life.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • While in the race, Siska and Shen encounter weresnow that tries to form itself into scary snowdogs. The pugs bite “the snowmen’s snowy bottoms. After that the weresnow stopped its tricks.”
  • One of the racers goes over a bridge that breaks. As she is clinging to the edge, snowtrolls shout from the abyss. “They had been looking forward to Helga falling so that they could eat her. They started hurling big splinters of ice up at the bridge, hoping to dislodge her.” In the end, Siska and Shen are able to save her.
  • Siska and the other racers are kidnapped by yetis who feed them spaghetti in order to trick them. The yetis want them to wash dishes, because yetis like to make spaghetti but not clean up the mess.
  • One of the racers uses a rocket launcher to try to stop the other racers from making it to the finish line first. “’Take this, you scum!’ sneered Sir Basil. But just as he pulled the trigger, Side-Plate’s snow boot kicked the rocket launcher upward. The rocket whizzed harmlessly off into the sky.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • During True Winter, there are various types of magical snow. For example, shrink snow makes one of the racers shrink to the size of a toy soldier.
  • When the racers meet Snowfather, he shows them a special type of snow. He says, “Everything you see here is made of snow . . . the special anything snow that falls only here, at the top of the world. Shape it into whatever you want, and it will become real.” The Snowfather then creates a bird that comes to life.
  • The Snowfather visits Siska’s sick grandfather. The Snowfather blows on snow that begins to float upward. “The snow that was under Grandpa’s bed caught against the slats and the underneath of the mattress and kept rising, so that the bed was lifted with it.” When Siska’s grandpa floats into the air, Sika’s mother says, “He’s going on that one last journey that he always wished for.” The Snowfather replies, “He’s going to places even I have never seen.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

Better Off Undead

Adrian Lazarus has always felt like an outcast. But now that he’s dead, life gets even worse. Even though Adrian does not have a beating heart, he still feels the pain of people talking behind his back. When the school bully, Daryl, decides to target him, Adrian isn’t sure what to do. Then a mysterious girl, a beekeeping boy, and a seventh-grade sleuth enter his life. Can his friends help Adrian stay safe?

Now that Adrian is a zombie, he notices that the world is changing. Forest fires burn, super-flues spread, and bees vanish. While advertisements claim everyone is safe, Adrian and his friends are worried. Is there anything they can do to help the earth?

Better of Undead takes a humorous look at the inside of a junior high school and explores the need to fit in. When the school bully targets Adrian, he and his friends come up with an interesting way to stop the bullying. As Adrian suffers through junior high, he learns that being beautiful isn’t important. It’s what inside that matters. He also realizes that he does not have to let his zombie instincts take over.

Adrian tells his story in a humorous way that will make readers laugh. At the end of the story, the action slows as the author reinforces the messages. One message is that the environment is changing and you should do something about it. The danger of having personal data mined is also shown.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • Daryl, the school bully, pushes a girl and then hits Adrian in the face. “He turned away from me, head ducking down, then turned back and landed a sharp, compact punch to my face.”
  • Gia talks about all of the bad things that have happened. “Outside Quebec, massive fireballs incinerated part of a town. Thirty buildings melted into a thick greasy mass. Cars burned like crumpled paper. Forty-seven people died, and five of those bodies were never found. They were vaporized by the sudden blast of radiant heat.”
  • Adrian found a dead squirrel outside of his house and ate it. “A fresh kill, blood still leaking from its nose, but otherwise not too shabby.”
  • Adrian is taken to see a man who is interested in learning about Adrian’s condition. When a bodyguard tries to block his path, he thinks about biting him. “I felt a surge of power inside me that was beyond myself. It was something other, and greater, than my ordinary being . . . My eyes locked on the vein in the bodyguard’s neck. As I was about to attack, teeth bared. . . “
  • In order to trick the school bully, Adrian and his friend stage a fight at a school dance. “Adrian grabbed Zander by the shoulder, spun him around, and landed a right cross to his face. Zander fell backwards . . .” The two are kicked out of the dance and meet in the woods. “Zander charged forward, tackling me to the ground. . . Zander gained the advantage and viciously kicked me in the stomach . . . I leaped on Zander’s fallen body . . . I burst a large packet of fake blood that had been planted inside Zander’s shirt. While Zander shrieked in agony, my two hands tore up the string of sausage that had been hidden in the hollow. They dripped with bloody sauce.”
  • A doctor wants to run experiments on Adrian. In order to get him to agree, Adrian’s little brother and Adrian’s friends are kidnapped and held hostage. In order to escape, Zander “was punching the bodyguard on the head . . . The guard shrugged him off and with one backhanded blow swatted Zander to the ground . . . He snarled and gave me a two-handed shove that propelled me into the window. My forehead cracked against the thick pane.” When the house catches on fire, everyone is able to escape.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Pretty Pillz are mentioned several times. The Pillz claim to make everyone beautiful. “It’s as easy as swallowing a pill.”

Language

  • Profanity is used rarely, but includes: jerkwads, school butt, hell, and damn.
  • A kids at the smells the air near Adrian and says, “Stinks in here, don’t it? I mean, crap, it’s totally disgusting.”
  • A kid at school threatens to kick Adrian’s butt. When someone tells him to stop, the kid says, “Who. . . in the hell . . . are you?”
  • After being hit, Adrian yells, “Get out of here now or I’ll fire-trucking eat your brains! Only I didn’t say ‘fire-trucking.’ Because, like, who would? Is it even a word? No, I said a different f-word, one that I have heard before, plenty of times (I used to ride the school bus, after all).”
  • “Oh my God” is said several times. When told a story, Adrian replies, “Oh my God.”

Supernatural

  • Adrian dies when hit by a car. He describes himself as a “shuffler, ankle-dragger, shape-shifter, howler, freak. I am a living dad, soulless corpse, brain-sucker, crawler, spitter, wraith, wuss, dumb butt, flailer, mutant, haunt.”
  • Gia, who is allergic to bees, was stung by a swarm of them. “I woke up. I was alive, and I wasn’t supposed to be alive. . . That’s when I saw her, the queen bee. She sat on my chest, and I swear, Adrian, we regarded each other in perfect silence, like equals. . . And she spoke.”  The queen bee told Gia, “It all connects.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

The Lightning Queen

Eleven-year-old Teo lives in the Hills of Dust, where not much happens. His life is dull and there is not much hope of things changing in the future. Then a gypsy caravan arrives. The caravan’s Mistress of Destiny tells Teo his fortune–Esma, Queen of the Lightening, will be his lifelong friend. Once Teo and Esma know their fortune, they band together to make it come true.

Teo tells his own story in The Lighting Queen. Teo and his companions, a duck, a blind goat, and a three-legged skunk, bring the story of rural Mexico to life. However, what ultimately drives the story is Esma. She is a plucky heroine who believes that anything is possible, and her optimistic attitude brings inspiration to both Teo and the reader.

The Lightning Queen has plenty to love for readers of all ages. The characters (including the animals) are loveable. The story is engaging and sprinkled with humor. The storyline shows the harshness of life without going into graphic detail or adding unneeded violence. Through the story, the reader sees the importance of looking beyond the physical appearance of people and finding friendship in unlikely places.

Sexual Content

  • Teo and Esma kiss goodbye once. “Our lips touched like two bird wings brushing against each other for the tiniest of moments, then flying apart on their own separate journeys.”

Violence

  • Teo tells the story of when his father was hit by a car. “There was a screech and a thump . . .I remember blood and tears on his eyelashes . . . I remember the driver standing over my father, talking to another driver. Calmly. Too calmly. And most of all I remember their words . . . ‘It’s just an indio.’ Then the other man shrugged and said, ‘What’s one less indio?’ They dragged my father to the side of the road. They wiped his blood from their shirts with handkerchiefs. Then they got back into their cars and drove off.”
  • When Teo’s uncle sees the gypsies giving fortunes, he becomes angry and, “flipped the table over. Cards scattered . . . other Romani woman gasped and skittered backwards with the toddlers. My aunts pulled away, against the wall, holding their own children. My uncle lunged toward Uncle Paco, trying to restrain him.”
  • The schoolteacher hits a boy’s hand with a ruler. “Tears streamed down his cheeks and he cried out. Twice. Now the boy was sobbing, trembling. Three times. Snot and tears covered his face, and his eyes were wide with fear.”
  • The schoolteacher hits Teo’s hand with a ruler. “There was a crack, a bolt of pain like fire that shot through my entire body. My hand wanted, more than anything, to pull away.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • The gypsies tell fortunes. At the beginning of the story, a gypsy tells Teo’s fortune—that he and Esma were destined to be friends for life. The two decided to do everything they can to make the fortune come true.
  • Esma puts a “pretend” curse on the schoolteacher in order to make the teacher kinder to the students. Teo’s grandfather tells the two that he doesn’t like curses, even pretend ones.
  • Teo dies. In death, he sees his sister, father, and grandfather. Esma comes and sings to Teo’s dead body. Teo, “felt the strain of the silvery thread pulling me towards my body. At the same time, I felt the tug of the other world, so easy and glittering and colorful, the promise of an eternity playing with Lucita [his sister], basking in the warmth of Grandfather and Father . . . My soul string was stretched to a single, quivering delicate strand.” When Esma sings, Teo “floated downward” and comes back to life.
  • When Esma sings, people say they can feel their dead loved ones. “I can almost feel my grandmother here with me, as though Esma’s song has opened a path to somewhere hidden.”

Spiritual Content

  • Teo and Esma find a statue that looked like, “a raccoon wearing a giant crown of corncobs.” Teo tells Esma, “We call them diositos—little gods. People say they’re good luck. Most of us have one or two at home. But don’t tell the priest about it.”
  • Teo’s grandfather gives his uncle a “limpia to clean his spirit. That meant spitting on him with cactus liquor and beating him with bundles of herbs.”

 

The Lightning Thief

Percy’s life consists of him being moved from boarding school, to military school, to private school. Pretty much any school that will take him. Because no matter where he goes, or how good he tries to be, something always goes wrong.

At the end of sixth grade, Percy figures out why is life has always been so difficult. He is the son of the Greek god Poseidon, which makes him a half-blood. A demi-god. Monsters are attracted to him. To protect himself, Percy goes to Camp Half-blood, where he learns sword fighting, archery, and a myriad of other skills that he will need to survive. He soon learns that his father is on the brink of war with Zeus and that he may be the only one who can stop it. The Lightning Thief is an enjoyable adventure that will keep readers engaged. There is a lot of fighting with monsters, but asides from that this book is friendly to younger readers.

Sexual Content

  • Dionysus is on probation because he, “took a fancy to a wood nymph who had been declared off-limits.”

Violence

  • Percy is taught in class how Kronos ate his children “And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters.”
  • It turns out Percy’s teacher is a monster in disguise. “She snarled, ‘Die, honey!’ And she flew right at me . . . I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword. The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. Hisss!”
  • Percy is in a car crash. “There was a blinding flash, a jaw-rattling boom!, and our car exploded. I remember feeling weightless, like I was being crushed, fried and hosed down all at the same time.”
  • Percy loses his mother. “Then, with an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around my mother’s neck, and she dissolved before my eyes, melting into light, a shimmering golden form . . . A blinding flash, and she was simply . . . gone.”
  • Furies attack Percy. “I turned and sliced the Fury on the right. As soon as the blade connected with her neck, she screamed and exploded into dust.”
  • Percy kills Medusa. “I slashed up with my sword, heard a sickening shlock!, then a hiss like wind rushing out of a cavern – the sound of a monster disintegrating . . . I could feel warm ooze soaking into my sock.”
  • A Chimera attacks Percy. “Before I could swing my sword, it opened its mouth, emitting a stench like the world’s largest barbecue pit, and shot a column of flame straight at me. I dove through the explosion. The carpet burst into flames; the heat was so intense, it nearly seared off my eyebrows.”
  • Percy kills a monster. “The ropes readjusted themselves at my command. Crusty’s whole head struck out the top. His feet stuck out the bottom . . . I had no qualms about what I was about to do . . . I swung the sword. Crusty stopped making offers.”
  • Percy goes to the Underworld. “Even from far away, I could see people being chased by hellhounds, burned at the stake, forced to run naked through cactus patches or listen to opera music. I could just make out a tiny hill, with the ant-size figure of Sisyphus struggling to move his boulder to the top. And I saw worse tortures, too – things I don’t want to describe.”
  • Percy kills a wild boar in self-defense. “I slashed upward. The boar’s severed right tusk fell at my feet, while the disoriented animal charged into the sea . . . a wave surged up from nowhere and engulfed the boar, wrapping around it like a blanket. The beast squealed once in terror. Then it was gone, swallowed by the sea.”
  • Percy’s mother turns her abusive husband to stone with Medusa’s head.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • The director of Camp Half-Blood is Dionysus, the god of wine. “He waved his hand and a goblet appeared . . . The goblet filled itself with red wine.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Percy Jackson is a demi-god, the son of Poseidon. He goes to Camp Half-Blood, where there are demi-gods, satyrs, nymphs, a centaur, and even a minor god. All the monsters of Greek mythology are real too.

 

Spiritual Content

  • Percy and Chiron discuss the existence of the Greek gods. Percy said, “You’re telling me there’s such a thing as God.” Chiron replies, “God – capital G, God. That’s a different matter altogether. We shan’t deal with the metaphysical . . . gods, plural, as in, great beings that control the forces of nature and human endeavors: the immortal gods of Olympus. That’s a smaller matter.”
  • Percy visits the Underworld, ruled by Hades.
  • After every meal at camp, “everyone was taking a portion of their meal and dropping it into the fire, the ripest strawberry, the juiciest slice of beef, the warmest, most buttery roll . . . Burnt offerings for the gods.”

The Battle of the Labyrinth

The inevitable fight with Kronos is still building, and this time Percy must travel with his friends into the depths of the ever-changing Labyrinth. No one knows who to trust, as Kronos continues to convert monsters, half-bloods, and demons to his side of the war. Percy finds himself battling monsters he has never seen, all while dealing with his confusing relationship with Annabeth and helping Grover finally track down the lost god Pan.

The setting is full of tension and excitement.  New characters arrive on the scene, adding intrigue and mystery. The ending will leave the reader gasping in surprise as they reach for the next book in the series.

Percy has finally reached high school, and begins to notice the opposite sex; however, there is no romantic relationship. There is a burgeoning physical attraction between him and Annabeth. The Battle of the Labyrinth is a little more mature, and the fight scenes become slightly more graphic. Despite this, the novel is appropriate for younger readers.

 Sexual Content

  • When Percy meets two empousai (monsters similar to vampires) they use their powers to charm him. One asks Percy for a kiss. He thinks, “She smelled like roses and clean animal fur–a weird but somehow intoxicating smell.”
  • Sea demons watch a video about puberty. “As a young sea demon matures, the narrator said, changes happen in the monster’s body. You may notice your fangs getting longer and you may have a sudden desire to devour human beings. These changes are perfectly normal.”
  • Annabeth kisses Percy. “Annabeth glared at me like she was going to punch me. And then she did something that surprised me even more. She kissed me.”

Violence

  • An empousai attacks Percy and Rachel. “I slashed with Riptide. Tammi tried to dodge my blade, but I sliced straight through her cheerleader uniform, and with a horrible wail she exploded into dust all over Rachel.”
  • Percy meets flesh-eating horses. “Come inside! Eat you! Tasty half-blood! . . . Poseidon can come in, too! We will eat you both! Seafood!”
  • Percy fights a monster called Geryon. “I went on the attack. Geryon parried my first strike with a pair of red-hot tongs and lunged at my face with a barbecue fork. I got inside his next thrust and stabbed him right through the middle chest.”
  • Daedalus kills his nephew. “Somehow he managed to grab the rim of the tower with his fingers as he fell. ‘Uncle!’ He screamed. ‘Help me!’ The old man’s face was a mask. He did not move from his spot.”
  • Percy meets Antaus, who decorates his court with skulls. “They grinned from pikes at the back of the stands and hung on chains from the ceiling like horrible chandeliers. Some of them looked very old–nothing but bleached-white bone. Others looked a lot fresher. I’m not going to describe them. Believe me, you don’t want to know.”
  • Percy kills Antaus. “I stabbed the giant in the stomach. He bellowed, and sand poured out, but he was too far up to touch the earth, and the dirt did not rise to help him. Antaeus just dissolved, pouring out bit by bit, until there was nothing left.”
  • During a battle, Nico summons the dead to help him. “The earth trembled. A fissure opened in front of the dracaenae, and a dozen undead warriors crawled from the earth.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Half-bloods drink nectar when they are injured. The nectar heals and strengths them.

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Nico, son of Hades, summons the dead. ” ‘In my day, we used animal blood,’ the ghost mumbled . . . The grave started to bubble. Frothy brown liquid rose to the top like the whole thing was filling with soda . . . Nico had summoned the dead with Coke and cheeseburgers.”
  • Percy meets many monsters, such as giants, hundred-handed ones, and Kampe. “It was sort of like a centaur, with a woman’s body from the waist up. But instead of a horse’s lower body, it had the body of a dragon–at least twenty feet long, black and scaly with enormous claws and a barbed tail.”
  • Kronos possesses Luke’s body. “Luke sat bolt upright. His eyes opened, and they were no longer blue. They were golden, the same color as the coffin. The hole in his chest was gone. He was complete.”

Spiritual Content

  • Percy and his friends discuss how immortal gods and monsters can still die. “Even immortality has limits. Sometimes . . . sometimes monsters get forgotten and they lose their will to stay immortal.”
  • Daedalus, who has cheated death for two millennia, decides to pass on. ” ‘Whoa,’ I said. ‘Pass on? But you can’t just kill yourself. That’s wrong!’ He shook his head. ‘Not as wrong as hiding from my crimes for two thousand years . . . My time has come.’ “

 

 

The Last Olympian

Percy has reached sixteen, the age at which the Great Prophecy will be revealed. Percy can’t spend time worrying about what the prophecy means because Kronos has stepped out of the shadows and has declared war against Olympus. It will take all the Olympians and demigods that Percy can muster to stop Kronos, and that might not even be enough.

The Last Olympian’s content grows with Percy, who must deal with death and war. The entire second half of the book spans a series of battles that take place in New York City. This is by far the most action-packed book in the series. While a couple of deaths are intense, the majority are monsters simply disintegrated into dust and the war is not graphically described.

Sexual Content

  • Rachel hints that she wants Percy to kiss her. Rachel says, “And so . . . hypothetically, if these two people liked each other, what would it take to get the stupid guy to kiss the girl, huh?”
  • Percy thinks about how demigods aren’t related to the children of other gods. “A demigod would never think about dating someone who had the same godly parent . . . But a daughter of Aphrodite and a son of Hephaestus? They’re not related. So it’s no problem.”
  • Annabeth kisses Percy. “Then she laughed for real, and she put her hands around my neck . . . When she kissed me, I had the feeling my brain was melting right through my body.”

Violence

  • Percy kills a giant crab monster. “I jabbed Riptide into the chink in its armor . . . The monster shuddered and hissed. Its eyes dissolved. Its shell turned bright red as its insides evaporated.”
  • Percy and Beckendorf blow up an enemy ship, but Beckendorf doesn’t make it out. “The Princess Andromeda blew up from both sides, a massive fireball of green flame roiling into the dark sky, consuming everything. Beckendorf, I thought. Then I blacked out.”
  • Percy gets frustrated with a stubborn satyr. “I grabbed him by the shirt, which seriously wasn’t like me, but the stupid old goat was making me mad.”
  • Percy fights an army of the dead. “There was nothing left of them but weapons in the sand and piles of smoking, empty uniforms. I had destroyed them all . . . I looked down at my clothes. They were slashed to pieces and full of bullet holes, but I was fine. Not a mark on me.”
  • Conner thinks about looting a candy store when everyone in New York City is asleep.
  • Luke destroys Kronos by killing himself. “He stabbed himself. It wasn’t a deep cut, but Luke howled. His eyes glowed like lava. The throne room shook.”
  • The last half of this book is a giant war that takes place in New York City. There is a lot of violence and some deaths, but most of it is not graphically described.
  • “An entire phalanx of dracaenae marched in the lead, their shields locked together, spear tips bristling over the top. An occasional arrow would connect with their snaky trunks, or a neck, or a chink in their armor, and the unlucky snake woman would disintegrate.”
  • “I tossed [the Minotaur] over the side of the bridge. Even as he fell, he was disintegrating.”
  • “Annabeth and I raced from block to block, trying to shore up our defenses. Too many of our friends lay wounded in the streets. Too many were missing.”
  • “Her features, once beautiful, were badly burned from poison. I could tell that no amount of nectar or ambrosia would save her.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • Percy says “Oh, gods” once or twice.

Supernatural

  • The Oracle gives prophecies about the future that always come true.
  • Percy rides on a hellhound, who can travel through shadows.
  • Luke’s mother sees horrible visions of the future. “My child . . . Must protect him! Hermes, help! Not my child! Not his fate – no!”
  • Morpheus puts the city of New York to sleep.
  • Percy is dipped in the River Styx and becomes invincible.
  • Kronos resides in Luke’s body because Kronos has no form of his own.
  • Percy is a half-blood, the son of Poseidon. The Greek gods, monsters, and most things from the old Greek tales are all true.

Spiritual Content

  • Percy feels guilty for the deaths of the demigods who were killed when he blew up the enemy ship. Poseidon tells Percy, “They all chose to battle for Kronos . . . they chose their path.”

by Morgan Lynn

The Titan’s Curse

Percy, Annabeth, and Thalia are working together to save a pair of half-bloods from the monster who kidnapped them. But when Annabeth is lost, Percy will stop at nothing to save her. Meanwhile, Kronos bides his time, forever scheming to take over the world. His General has escaped eternal punishment and is amassing an army to take down Olympus.  A prophecy tells of a quest to stop the upcoming terror, and Percy joins despite not being chosen to go. Soon he is traveling across the country with Thalia and three of Artemis’ Hunters on a journey to save Annabeth, a goddess, and the world itself.

This installment of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series is riveting and full of suspense. As Percy grows he comes into his own as a powerful son of Poseidon. New characters keep this book fresh, while the constant action keeps readers on the edge of their seats. Aside from the frequent, non-graphic violence, there is little in this book that would exclude younger readers.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • When Apollo’s sun bus crashes into a lake, “steam billowed up . . . ‘Well,’ said Apollo with a brave smile . . . ‘Let’s go see if we boiled anyone important, shall we?'”
  • Thalia and Percy get into a fight. “Thalia pushed me, and a shock went through my body that blew me backward ten feet into the water . . . Anger roared in my ears. A wave erupted from the creek, blasting into Thalia’s face and dousing her from head to toe . . . Thalia yelled, and a blast of lightning came down from the sky, hit her spear like a lightning rod, and slammed into my chest.”
  • Percy fights a lion with his friends. “Immediately, arrows pierced the lion’s maw—two, four, six. The lion thrashed wildly, turned, and fell backward. And then it was still.”
  • Percy fights skeleton creatures. “I thought I was doing pretty well, until the other two skeletons shot me in the back . . . I landed face down in the street. Then I realized something . . . I wasn’t dead. The impact of the bullets had been dull, like a push from behind, but they hadn’t hurt me.”
  • Bianca climbs into a giant robot to stop it from killing her and her friends. When Bianca stops the robot, it collapses, and Bianca “was gone.” Bianca’s friends assumed she died.
  • Dionysus, the god of wine, saves Percy from a manticore (a flying monster) and skeletons. “SNAP! It was the sound of many minds breaking at the same time. The sound of madness. One guard put his pistol between his teeth like it was a bone and ran around on all fours . . . the planks under his paws erupted into grape wines, which immediately began wrapping around the monster’s body . . . until he was engulfed in a huge mass of vines, leaves, and full clusters of purple grapes. Finally the grapes stopped shivering, and I had the feeling that somewhere inside there, the manticore was no more.”
  • Zoe is wounded in a fight. “She leaped between her father and Artemis and shot an arrow straight into the Titan’s forehead, where it lodged like a unicorn’s horn. Atlas bellowed in rage. He swept aside his daughter with the back of his hand, sending her flying into the black rocks.”
  • Luke is mortally wounded. “Talia kicked Luke away. He lost his balance, terror on his face, and then he fell . . . We rushed to the cliff’s edge . . . They were staring at Luke’s broken form on the rocks.”
  • The Olympians debate whether to smite Percy and his friends. Poseidon says, “They are worthy heroes. We will not blast my son to bits.”
  • While fighting a monster, Percy is injured. “My coat and shirt were pinned to the wall by some kind of spike—a black dagger-like projectile about a foot long. It had grazed the skin of my shoulder as it passed through my clothes, and the cut burned. I’d felt something like this before. Poison.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Thalia’s mother died. Someone explains her death: “heavy drinker, and apparently she was out driving late one night about two years ago, and . . . “
  • Dionysus mentions wine several times and procures it once or twice. “He glanced up innocently from the pages of Wine Connoisseur He said, ‘Ah, pinot noir is making a comeback.'”

Language

  • Percy and his friends visit Hoover Dam and start making jokes about “the dam snack bar” and “some dam French fries” and “the dam restroom.”

Supernatural

  • The ancient Greek gods, heroes, and monsters are all real.
  • Bianca pledges herself to Artemis, and when she becomes one of Artemis’ maidens, she is granted immortality.
  • Zeus brings a pair of angel statues to life, so they can help his daughter.

Spiritual Content

  • After a battle, Artemis thinks the monsters are stirring. She says, “Let us pray I am wrong.” Percy asks, “Can goddesses pray?”

by Morgan Lynn

The Sea of Monsters

Percy is a year older, but much remains the same. Once again, Percy is expelled from school when attacked by monsters, and he must flee to Camp Half-Blood. But Camp Half-Blood is not the safe haven Percy was looking for. The camp’s magical boundaries are dying, and soon Percy is on another quest. Joined by Annabeth and his new half-brother Tyson, Percy traverses the Sea of Monsters to both rescue Grover and save the future of Camp Half-Blood.

A wonderfully engaging story, Percy takes readers on an epic journey of strength and heroism. The reader will learn about acceptance alongside Percy because one of the themes is not to judge someone based on his or her looks.  The Sea of Monsters has many, well, monsters. As a result, there is much fighting, but the violence is not portrayed in a bloody manner.

Sexual Content

  • When they win a race, “Annabeth planted a kiss on [Percy’s] cheek.”

Violence

  • Percy plays dodgeball with cannibals. One cannibal says, “We Laistrygonians aren’t just playing for your death. We want lunch!” Then the cannibal “waved his hand and a new batch of dodgeballs appeared on the center line . . . They were bronze, the size of cannon balls, perforated like wiffle balls with fire bubbling out the holes.”
  • Annabeth kills one of the cannibals. “Suddenly the giant’s body went rigid. His expression changed from gloating to surprise. Right where his belly button should’ve been, his T-shirt ripped open and he grew something like a horn—no, not a horn—the glowing tip of a blade.”
  • Tantalus tells the story of why he was punished. “No one noticed that his children were missing. And when he served the gods dinner, my dear campers, can you guess what was in the stew?”
  • Percy is attacked by a Hydra. “There was a flash of light, a column of smoke, and the Hydra exploded right in front of us, showering us with nasty green slime that vaporized as soon as it hit, the way monster guts tend to do.”
  • Percy’s boat explodes. “I spun in the air, got clonked on the head by something hard, and hit the water with a crash . . . The last thing I remembered was sinking in a burning sea, knowing that Tyson was gone forever, and wishing I were able to drown.”
  • Percy runs into piranha sheep. “The deer stumbled and was lost in a sea of wool and trampling hooves. Grass and tufts of fur flew into the air. A second later, the sheep all moved away, back to their regular peaceful wanderings. Where the deer had been was a pile of clean white bones.”
  • Percy and Clarisse fight the Cyclops. “She charged the Cyclops again and again. He pounded the ground, stomped at her, grabbed at her, but she was too quick. And as soon as she made an attack, I followed up by stabbing the monster in the toe or the ankle or the hand.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Percy drinks a potion that turns him into a guinea pig.

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Percy is a half-blood, the son of Poseidon. The Greek gods, monsters, and most things from the old Greek tales are all true.

Spiritual Content

  • None

by Morgan Lynn

13 Treasures

Tanya can see fairies—evil fairies who want to keep their existence secret. When Tanya writes about the fairies in her diary, they come to punish her. They pinch her, rouse her from her sleep, and cast spells on her. Tanya’s strange behavior can’t be ignored or explained, and her mother isn’t sure what to do. In an effort to get Tanya to behave, her mother sends her to Elvesden Manor, her grandmother’s secluded estate.

In the hopes of learning more about how to protect herself from the fairies, Tanya sneaks into her grandmother’s library. Soon Tanya is mixed up in a fifty-year-old mystery of a missing girl. But as Tanya tries to unravel the mysteries of her second sight, she soon discovers that there is more to the fairy realm that she first believed. And if she is not careful, she may be pulled into the fairy world and never be able to return home.

Right from the start, 13 Treasures creates suspense as the fairies attack Tanya. Tanya struggles to keep the fairies secret (or they will seek revenge) but also explain her strange behavior. When Tanya is sent to her grandmother’s house, no one is particularly glad to see her, except Fabian the care keeper’s son. The tension in the house creates suspense. The evil fairies, the unwelcoming grandmother, and the string of missing children all lead to a creepy mystery. However, Tanya proves to be a compassionate, plucky heroine that befriends a goblin.

13 Treasures is full of fairy lore, strange creatures, and complicated characters who add interest to the story. Younger children will enjoy having a few scares that don’t leave them frightened. Even though the story is written for 8-12-year-olds, the language and the long descriptive passages may be difficult for some children.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • When Tanya writes about the fairies in her diary, they come into her room and warn her to stop.  One fairy makes Tanya float in the air and turn somersaults. Then, she is dropped and crashes to the floor.
  • When a goblin tells Tanya too much information, the other goblins beat him. “The goblin howled as Toadface drove a heavy fist into his stomach . . . The bruised goblin was left weeping in a heap on the ground. He had sustained several cuts to his face and was bleeding profusely, his lower lip split and swollen.”
  • When Warwick sneaks up and grabs Tanya’s shoulder, she kicks him in the shin.
  • When Tanya and Fabian try to go into the woods, a raven attacks Fabian. “It hooked onto the back of Fabian’s mud-drenched clothes with long, black talons, and began a frenzied attack on the back of his head.”
  • A drain dweller grabs Tanya’s wrist, trying to rip off a bracelet. As Tanya struggles to get the drain dweller to let go of her, it bites her. “She felt, rather than saw, the blood running down her arm and dripping from her elbow.” When the drain dweller gets the bracelet, it runs out the door and is eaten by the cat. “The creature did not scream when the cat’s claws found their target, or even whimper as the broken, aged teeth clamped down on its windpipe for the kill.”
  • In order for a human to escape the fairy realm, they must have another to take their place. Tanya is tied to a tree with spider twine so she can be forced to go into the fairy realm.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • When Fabian sees a drain dweller he yells, “And what the hell is that?”

Supernatural

  • There are fairies, goblins, and other creatures.
  • Tanya has the second sight because someone in her family was switched with a changeling. “The second sight comes from having fairy blood.”
  • A gypsy who lives in the woods is said to be able to see into the past. The gypsy gives Tanya a compass that will show the direction of her home.
  • The fairies threaten to use rosemary that grows in the piskies’ domains to wipe Tanya’s memory.
  • Fabian believes that a girl he saw in the woods could be a ghost. “Maybe she’s trying to tell us that he did kill her all those years ago. Maybe she can’t move on until justice is done.”
  • The fairies use a glamour to disguise a fairy child that was switched with a human child. One of the characters is afraid the glamour will wear off and the baby would be, “put under observation in a laboratory somewhere—analyzed, poked, prodded, and experimented on.”
  • Tanya is told that she must destroy anything that the fairies could use to control her. “Blood. Saliva. Fingernail and toenail clippings. Teeth. All the stories of witchcraft, of people being controlled by a witch in possession of a lock of their hair or a tooth—it all stems from the truth. You don’t leave anything to chance.”
  • Tanya is given a potion to rub on Fabian’s eyes so he can see the fairies.

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

A Plague of Bogles

Bogles don’t hide in closets; they hide in small, dark places where they lie in wait for children they can devour.  Many adults don’t believe bogles exist, but Jem has seen a bogle.  When a child is sent to fetch some sherry from a basement and never returns, Mable goes in search of help and finds Jem.  Jem searches out the only person who can help, a bogler named Alfred.

In order to catch a bogle, Alfred needs some bait—a singing child.  In order to get off of the streets, Jem agrees to be bogle bait.  Jem and Alfred meet several interesting characters who have bogles that need eradicating. Soon they discover they need the help of Birdie, a gutsy girl with a beautiful voice.

To complicate the story, Jem is also trying to hide a secret.  As Jem tries to help solve the mystery of why there are so many bogles in one area, he is also trying to find Sarah Pickles, the woman who sold him as bogle food.

The story begins with suspense and mystery that make it more interesting for readers, but the language may be difficult for younger audiences.  For example, Jem says, “I never prigged a thing, save for that morsel o’ cheese.” The book also mentions debtors’ prisoners and homeless children.  The complicated themes and adult nature of some scenes may not be suitable for all children.

Jem is frightened of going to prison because of his past misdeeds, and he thinks about this often. Even though Jem does not want to end up in prison, he does not feel bad about stealing. Instead, Jem seems to think thievery is acceptable.  Jem, “had always favored the idea of bogling, because bogling was such a flash occupation, like smuggling or highway robbery.” As Alfred and Jem go about the city, they spend time in a tavern, where alcohol is served. (Although Jem would like some, Alfred won’t allow it.)

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • When Jem picks a morsel o’ cheese off the floor and eats it, he is beaten.
  • Jem is in a circle of salt when a bogle puts its two viscous arms around him. Then he jumps out of the way when he hears “a cry and a loud hissing noise. The air filled with foul-smelling steam,” and the bogle is dead. (In total there are three bogles that are killed, in a similar fashion.)
  • Jem thinks about Newgate prison, a place he fears, because he knew “several people who had been hanged there.”
  • At one point in the story, Jem remembers a time when he “once helped to rob a woman’s house while she was making her regular weekly visit to her dead child’s grave.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • A child was working for a tavern. She was sent to fetch some sherry when she disappeared; she’s presumed to be eaten by a bogle.
  • Jem sings the following song: “There is a nook in the boozing ken,/Where many a mug I fog,/and the smoke curls gently, while cousin Ben/keeps filling the pots again and again,/ if the covers have stumped their hogs./The liquors around is diamond bright,/And the diddle is best of all;/ But I never in liquors took much delight,/For liquors I think is all bite.”
  • After Alfred and Jem dispose of a bogle, they go to a tavern where Alfred was jostled by “loud men in dirty clothes, many of whom were so drunk that only the press of bodies kept them upright.  Jem noticed at least two gaping pockets just asking to be picked-pockets belonging to men who would never know, by morning, whether they had spent their missing money or been fleeced of it.”
  • The following is another song Jem sings: “The heavy wet in a pewter quart/ As brown as a badger’s hue, More than Bristol milk or gin,/ Brandy or rum I tipple in, With me darling blown, Sue.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • To catch a bogle, Alfred must lay out a circle of salt with a gap in the ring so the boggle can enter it. In order to kill a bogle, it must be hit with a spear.
  • When a bogle is near, a child feels a sense of despair.

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

 

The Last Bogler

Alfred Bunce is out to rid Victorian London of bogles. In order to reach his goal, Alfred needs all the help he can get. Alfred and his apprentice, Ned, work with the Sewers Office to find and eliminate bogles. However, the bogles are acting unpredictably and Ned wonders if he has enough skill to become the next bogler.

To add to the suspense, an old enemy is out for revenge, and Ned’s life is in danger. Can Ned survive long enough to help Alfred rid London of bogles?

Ned is thankful that Alfred has taken him off the street, but Ned doesn’t think he wants to take Alfred’s place as the last bogler. The Last Bogler focuses more on Ned and his internal conflict, which makes the book less interesting than the previous two.

Although new characters are added, none of them are particularly memorable. The Last Bogler is not a stand-alone book; if the first two books haven’t been read, it may be hard to follow the plot. Additionally, much like the first two books, the language may be difficult for some readers.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • Alfred and Ned kill bogles. None of the deaths are described in detail. When one bogle is killed, it “reared up, frothing and hissing, its tentacles writhing, caught in the glittering trap—Bang! It exploded like a giant grape, releasing a geyser of black liquid.”
  • Alfred kills another bogle. “Suddenly there was no bogle. Nothing remained except a rapidly deflating, crusty black thing that looked like an oversized boil. Alfred’s spear was sticking out of it.”
  • Mr. Harwood is attacked, but it is not described. “By the time Alfred and Ned rounded the next corner, Mr. Harwood was already on his back in the middle of the alley, with both hands clamped over his nose.”
  • Someone tries to kill Ned, but the attack is not described. Ned’s “hair was ruffled, his knuckles were grazed, and there was a rip in the knee of his trousers.” Later, the attacker confesses that he was paid to kill Ned.
  • Jack Gammon tries to kill Ned and Alfred. Jack threatens to “chop him into pieces.” In the end, Jack falls to his death. Ned “would never forget the horror of shouting for help . . . with Jack Gammon’s shattered body lying in a pool of blood at his feet.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Alfred and another man talk about a missing person. They are unsure if he was taken by a bogle or “he’s tucked away in the Nell Gwynne public house, drinking himself witless.”

Language

  • When a newsboy is seen following Ned, someone says, “Why, what a damnable cheek!”
  • Alfred tells someone that a lady only cares about “that hoard o’ coins in her piss pot.”

Supernatural

  • Alfred is called a “Go-Devil Man.”
  • To catch a bogle, Alfred must lay out a circle of salt with a gap in the ring so the bogle can enter it. In order to kill a bogle, it must be hit with a spear.
  • When a bogle is near, a child feels a sense of despair.
  • Alfred visits a lady known for making potions and curses. She also talks about types of herbs that are “for deathwork” and others that drive away the devil, or attack magic.
  • Alfred learns that his spear is made from “blackthorn with a consecrated point on it” and that it has herbs that are “used for cursing.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

The Hypnotists

Jax’s eyes have always changed colors. And when people begin doing exactly what Jax tells them, he wonders if there is more to his color-changing eyes than he knows. Soon, Jax finds himself invited to meet Dr. Mako. Dr. Mako promises to teach Jax to harness the power to hypnotize people.

Excited by the prospect of learning more about his powers, Jax falls under Dr. Mako’s spell. However, Jax begins to wonder why Dr. Mako is so interested in his powers. Jax isn’t sure if Dr. Mako can be trusted. Soon Jax is tangled in a web of deception. Jax must figure out how to save his best friend, his parents, and the United States from Dr. Mako’s evil plan.

Jax’s newly emerging power adds humor and suspense to The Hypnotist. Younger readers will enjoy watching Jax learn to use his power and struggle with the responsibility of being able to hypnotize others. Jax works through many of his problems by talking to his best friend Tommy. This allows the reader to understand Jax’s emotions. The relationship between Jax and Tommy adds to the story’s plot and helps keep the story’s tone kid friendly. Even though much of the conflict revolves around Dr. Mako, who turns out to be an evil villain, the violence is age appropriate for children because it is not described in detail or in a scary manner.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • A man is hypnotized and ordered to jump off a bridge. Jax, “could hear the sound of someone in terrible distress, sobbing as if the end of the world were at hand . . . they watched in horror as the young man hoisted himself over the barrier and stood poised, trembling, on the narrow ledge.” Jax re-hypnotizes the man and saves his life.
  • Dr. Mako puts a post-hypnotic suggestion on Jax’s parents. If Jax doesn’t do what Dr. Mako wants, he will tell Jax’s parents to kill themselves. Dr. Mako tells Jax, “I won’t mention the trigger word yet. It’s too dangerous. When they hear it, both your parents will proceed to the nearest subway station and throw themselves in front of an uptown train.”
  • Jax parents throw themselves in front of a train. No one is injured.
  • Dr. Mako hypnotizes Jax and has him jump off a building. A mob of people hold up curtains and catch Jax, which prevents him from being killed.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Many of the characters in the book can hypnotize others. One of the character’s specialties is, “A series of post-hypnotic suggestions that could be activated later.”
  • Throughout the story, many characters are hypnotized without their knowledge.
  • When Jax is learning to hypnotize others, he learns that, “the mesmeric connection is a powerful coupling of two minds. . . When you ‘see’ through your subject’s eyes, you’ve admitted a stranger’s consciousness into your head.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

The Dragonfly Effect

Jax is unsure if the military is protecting him or keeping him prisoner. The military promised to protect Jax and his family from Mako, a hypnotic mastermind who wants Jax dead.

Soon Jax learns that the military’s protection comes at a price. They want to use Jax’s hypnotic powers as a military weapon. The military wants to figure out how to use Jax’s ability to control people through video broadcast, but Jax only wants to use his powers for good. Soon Jax is using his hypnotic power in military experiments that could cost people their lives.

Then Mako escapes from prison. With the help of a young boy with hypnotic powers, Mako plans to put the entire world into a hypnotic state, which will not allow people to move as the world falls apart without them. Jax, with the help of two friends, must avoid being captured by the military or Mako in order to save the world.

The Dragonfly Effect is filled with suspense and adventure. Jax is stuck between following the orders of the adults around him and doing what he knows is right. Although there is violence in the book, it is not described in detail and is age-appropriate for children.

One likable aspect of the story is Jax’s parents. They know about Jax’s hypnotic powers, and even when Jax uses his skills to hypnotize them, they are smart enough to know that Jax is trying to manipulate them. Even though Jax is the main focus of the story, his parents come across as a smart, loving couple, which is rare in today’s books.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • Jax puts a pilot into a hypnotic state. While in the hypnotic state, the pilot crashes his plane. “The fireball lasted only a split second before the video went blank.” Jax becomes upset that “You made me kill him!” It is only then that Jax finds out the pilot was in a simulator and is fine.
  • When Jax breaks into a military facility, he is caught. “MPs stormed the room. Rough hands grabbed him, threw him to the floor, and flipped him over on his face. He felt his arms pinned behind him as cuffs were slapped on his wrist.”
  • In an experiment, Jax puts an entire town under a hypnotic state. The people are given an order to stop moving. As the people are frozen in place, disaster happens around them. Cars crash, houses burn, and other disasters begin, but the people never move.
  • Jax’s friend drives a Bobcat into a police station to free his friends.
  • Jax is kidnapped and put into a “chokehold. A knee in the small of his back lifted his heels slightly off the floor . . . He hung there paralyzed with pain.”
  • There is a fight between boys, which is described over a page. “Jax charged his enemy, grabbed him around the midsection, and drove forward like a wrestler.” In the end, no one is injured.
  • Under a hypnotic state, Jax is told, “The only thing that will make you feel more wonderful . . . is to take the pistol from that security man, hold it to your temple, and squeeze the trigger.”
  • A plane carrying Jax’s parents almost crashes when the pilot is put into a hypnotic state and freezes, unable to move.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

 

 

Podkin One-Ear

The legend of Podkin One-Ear has been passed down through traveling bards. On Midwinter Night, a traveling bard arrives at Thornwood Warren. He tells the exciting story of how Podkin One-Ear overcame the Gorm, a fierce, cruel, evil enemy. The legend of the greatest warrior their land has ever known will entertain and surprise readers.

Through the bard’s storytelling, Podkin and his siblings come to life. Podkin, the lazy son of a chieftain, never dreamed of becoming a great warrior. When the Gorm appear in their warren, kill their father, and capture their mother, Podkin and his siblings run for their lives. With the help of a magic dagger, a witch, and a blind mercenary, Podkin and his siblings might be able to defeat the Gorm. As Podkin One-Ear and his siblings flee for their lives, they discover the history of their land and the terrible truth behind how the Gorm came to be.

Told in the style of old legends, Podkin One-Ear contains suspense, monsters, and a bit of magic. The author’s descriptions bring the rabbit world to life.  Readers will cheer for Podkin and his siblings as they run from the Gorm and battle their way to save their mother. The Gorm and several of the battles are described in vivid detail and may frighten children. Through Podkin One-Ear’s tale, the reader will see how “you don’t have to be brave or strong or powerful to do incredible things.”

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • The Gorm and rats that were changed chase Podkin. “At the front, where their heads should have been, were fanged, drooling mouths, and glaring out of holes in their armor were blank, rust-red eyes . . . the things were now beasts. Iron beasts. Monsters.” Podkin escapes.
  • The Gorm have Paz, Podkin’s sister, corned. In order to save her, Podkin cuts a tree down. The tree falls on the Gorm, who have “surprised clouds of breath gushing from behind their iron masks, and then the tree hit with an explosion of snow crystals and a roar that echoed through the forest . . . the riders, nothing could be seen except a twisted shard of armor and a splash of rusty crimson blood on the snow.”
  • As Podkin tries to escape from rabbits, who are trying to capture him and turn him over to the Gorm, his ear is pinned to the ground by a prong of a portcullis. “Her brother’s eyes were bulging and his teeth were gnashing in pain.” In order to set her free, Paz has to cut the ear off. “It was funny to be running off into the woods, leaving a part of his body behind. But the funniest thing of all was that even after his ear had been sliced off, he could still feel the burning pain of the portcullis piercing it.”
  • A rabbit throws a rock at one of the Gorm’s birds. “. . . When it suddenly exploded with a clang and a puff of iron feathers . . . the crow had been knocked to the ground, stone dead.”
  • Podkin hires a mercenary, Crom, to help him free his kidnapped siblings. There is a fight over the course of several pages. “Crom strode right up and cracked him between the ears with Starclaw’s hilt. There was a hollow clinging sound, and Quince folded up into a senseless heap on the floor . . . The huge rabbit went flying backwards crashing into the earthen wall of the burrow, smashing a hole right through it, and bringing half the ceiling cascading down to bury him.”
  • When the head Gorm is looking for Podkin and his siblings, “The Gorm Lord grabbed the guard rabbit and threw him across the chamber. He sailed through the air like a broken doll, crashing into a candle stall, and sending sparks flying and hot wax showing everywhere.” The destruction of the market and the children’s escape is described over several pages. Someone throws “little black balls of something” at a warrior. “The balls exploded, filled with black sticky goo that smoked and burned. The warrior roared, dropped his sword and clawing at his face.”
  • Crom tells about how he and Podkin’s father learned to battle. During a battle, Crom “was positioned, and he (the enemy) was about to bring his stone ax down on my head. I just stood there, staring up at him in surprise.” Podkin’s father saves Crom.
  • Crom describes the battle that caused him to lose his sight. While fighting the Gorm, they went into battle but were unprepared. There was a witch rabbit. “She rode a black rat and called down lightning from the sky . . . her magic took my sight, and for days I lay under a pile of bodies in some kind of trance.” Some rabbits that were fleeing healed his wounds.
  • Podkin and his crew sneak into a Gorm camp to free other rabbits (including Podkin’s mother). The battle scene takes place over a chapter. Podkin slashes Scramashank’s ankle. “. . . He slung the dagger sideways, aiming for the spot above Scramashank’s ankle. Starclaw switched through, as if it were nothing more than a blade of grass.” Then a bank of mist appears, and the Gorm “fell to the ground, choking, gasping, and clutching at their throats. Their already terrified beast toppled over, trampling and crushing them in the snow.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • The chief has a cup of “frothy honey mead.”
  • One of the kidnappers is described as “clutching a half-drunk bottle of mead.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • A warren of rabbits were turned into the Gorm, evil and unnatural beings. No one knows what exactly happened; “some say they tunneled too far down and came across something cursed and poisonous. Others say it was the work of witches.”
  • The Gorm are not rabbits anymore. One of them is described as “a walking slab of metal and meat, pierced through with rusty thorns and nails. Its armor overlapped in sheets of jagged, dented iron, mottled with rust and splashes of dried crimson that looked very much like blood . . . Skulls hung from its belt. Rabbit skulls, painted all over with evil-looking runes.”
  • Podkin has a magical dagger that came from the Goddess. The dagger can cut anything that is not metal.
  • A rabbit, who is a witch, uses bones to tell the future. Her warren is safe because “there’s enough glamours and enchantments about this place that Hern himself, god though he be, couldn’t find it if I didn’t want him to.”

Spiritual Content

  • During Midwinter, a holiday much like Christmas, the Midwinter Rabbit visits the warrens bringing gifts.
  • The story often contains the phrase, “thank the Goddess,” and Podkin prays to the Goddess. The Goddess made the twelve tribes of rabbits.
  • Podkin hides from the Gorm and “gave a small prayer to the Goddess.”
  • As a warren of rabbits was digging a new longburrow, they found jutting metal, pulsing metal. Because they thought the metal thing was evil, “our priestess sealed off the tunnel with magic charms.”
  • A bard tells a group of children that there is a god of bards and storytellers. “His name is Clarion, and he has been known to whisper the art of stories into the ears of a chosen few rabbits while they sleep.”
  • Twin sisters Estra and Nixha, Goddesses of life and death, came to “our world and decided it was the place for them.” However, they had to get rid of Gormalech. They played a game that no one really won, but they came to an agreement. “The goddesses would rule the surface of the world, bringing life (and death) back to it, as before. Gormalech would go deep underground, where iron and all the other metals come from, and between them they would share the place.” Now Gormalech is creating the Gorm and “the Balance is broken.”
  • When talking about Podkin gambling, the bard said, “I’m sure lots of people have won lots of things, including the Goddess herself. But for everything they won, I bet . . . I mean, I’m sure . . . they lost even more. Pook won because he had a touch of magic about him when it came to casting bones. Not many other rabbits have that blessing. Whatever tales of glory heard, gambling is for idiots.”
  • The forest rabbits worship the god of the forest. When Crom declines leading his warren, the warren moved on. “Maybe the tribe had never been happy at Darkhollow in the first place. Or, more likely, losing their chieftain had been seen as some kind of sign from the gods. Religion made rabbits do some very strange things sometimes.”

 

Love Sugar Magic: A Dash of Trouble

Leo wants to be able to help her family prepare for the Dia de los Muertos festival. Leo’s family owns a bakery in Rose Hill, Texas. Every year, her family spends days preparing for the big celebration. This year, when Leo is told that she is once again too young to help, she sneaks out of school and into the bakery. She soon discovers that her mother, aunt, and four older sisters have been keeping a secret from her. They’re brujas—witches of Mexican ancestry—who pour a little bit of sweet magic into everything that they bake.

Leo is determined to test her magical abilities, even when her sisters tell her to wait until she is older. When her best friend Caroline has a problem, Leo is confident that she can craft a spell to solve Caroline’s problem.

A Dash of Trouble is the first book in a series about a Mexican-American family that lives in a diverse Texan town. The fantasy includes Spanish vocabulary that is easy to understand in the context of the book. The story brings the Mexican traditions for Día de los Muertos to life.

Even though Leo doesn’t always feel appreciated by her family, her family clearly loves her and wants what is best for her. Readers will be able to relate to Leo’s desire to be treated more like an adult (even when she doesn’t act like one) as well as her desire to help her friend.

Leo spies on her family, makes promises she does not intend to keep, and practices magic against her family’s wishes. When Leo accidentally shrinks a boy from her class, his mother is frightened and calls the police. When Leo is able to reverse the spell, her family is proud of her for figuring out how to solve the problem. The boy covers for Leo, saving the family’s magical secret. Leo’s story is entertaining and filled with humor. A Dash of Trouble would lead to a good discussion on the importance of honesty.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • None

Drugs and Alcohol

  • On the Day of the Dead, some people put alcohol on their family’s shrines.

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • The females in Leo’s family are witches, and they have a spellbook that has been handed down for generations. Leo’s sister explains, “But we’re not just any kind of witch. Brujería is practiced by lots of people in lots of different ways, and our special family power comes from the magic of sweetness; sweetness from love and sweetness from sugar.”
  • In Leo’s family, “each group of sisters gets magical talents based on the order in which they were born. Second-borns, like Mamá and me have the power of manifestation, which means we can produce objects—small ones, for the most part—whenever we need them.”
  • Another one of Leo’s sisters has the power of influence. “They make . . . suggestions. They can change a person’s feelings, make you happy or sad for no reason.” In one part of the book, she tries to influence Leo’s feelings.
  • Leo uses a spell to make pig cookies fly. They fly around and make a mess out of her room.
  • Leo’s sisters have the power to channel the dead, which they do during the Day of the Dead. “Belén spoke again, but it wasn’t her voice that came out. It was a man’s voice, and it came out of Belén’s throat.” Leo thinks, “. . . Day of the Dead was invented as a way to talk to people who have passed away, to remember them and show them that you still loved them. If messages helped people do that, they couldn’t be so scary.”
  • Leo’s sisters explain, “We can see and talk to any of the ghosts who are hanging around, no problem. It’s calling them, or channeling them so other people can hear, that takes extra effort.” The twins can see their abuela, or grandma, who hangs around because “she still has so much love tying her to the world of the living. The older ghosts get a little more . . . scattered, and then sometimes they stop showing up altogether—“
  • Leo’s sister, Marisol, tells her not to mess with magic, especially “big spells. They can have terrible consequences . . . And the more complicated the spell, the more one tiny experiment can mess things up, big-time.”
  • Leo makes cookies with a spell in the hopes of making a boy named Brent like her friend, Caroline. The spell does not work correctly. Instead, Brent begins writing love notes to all the girls in his class. He also tells several girls that he loves them “more than anything in the world.”
  • Leo accidentally shrinks Brent. “Inside the jar was a person. A tiny person unmistakably. The person was curled up and suspended in the honey, eyes closed and hands folded as if he were enjoying a nice nap.” With the help of her sisters and her dead grandmother, Leo is able to reverse the spell.
  • Leo’s abuela appears. “Sitting—no, actually, standing in the center of the bed, her body from the waist down disappearing through the mattress, was Abuela.”

 Spiritual

  • None

 

Wishtree

Red, an oak tree, has watched over his neighborhood for generations. As a “wishtree,” people have been putting their wishes on Red’s branches. Through his time watching and hearing people’s wishes, Red has gained much wisdom. Still, people confuse him.

Red’s best friend, a crow named Bongo, and the animals that live in Red’s hollows give Red’s life a sense of meaning. But when a new family moves into the house across from Red, he wishes that he could do something for the sad little girl who sits at the base of his trunk every night.

Red narrates this beautiful story about the complicated nature of friendship. Red comes alive and shines with personality in Wishtree. The story deals with the complicated issue of people who hate, but the themes are dealt with in a kid-friendly manner. Red’s animal friends come alive and bring a touch of humor to the story. Although Wishtree was written for 10- to 14-year-olds, the story will captivate an older audience as well.

Sexual Content

  • Red explains that he is different than other trees. “Some trees are male. Some trees are female. And some, like me, are both . . . call me she. Call me he. Anything will work.”

Violence

  • A boy carves the words “leave” into Red’s bark. “I couldn’t tell what he was carving, of course. But I could tell from the determined way he moved that it was meant to hurt.”
  • Red talks about some things that happen in his neighborhood. “Someone threw raw eggs at the blue house. One afternoon, a car passed by, filled with angry men yelling angry things, things like ‘Muslims, get out!’”
  • Someone throws raw eggs at Red. “Splat. Splat. Two more times, and the car roared off with a screech of tires.”
  • Bongo leaves a “large deposit” on the boy who carved the words into Red’s trunk.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

Timeless: Diego and the Rangers of the Vastlantic

Time collided. Now dinosaurs roam with robots. Humans from three different time periods now live on Earth. Diego’s parents come from two different time periods and hope to make their home, New Chicago, a better place.

In Diego’s world, conflict is ever-present. Not everyone believes that kids from different eras of history and from different cultures should interact. Some still wish for the world that they came from before time collided.

When Diego’s father, a New Chicago’s top engineer, is taken by rebels, Diego vows to help free his father. Diego thinks the key is to build bigger, stronger weapons. However, when he and three others accidentally end up on a pirate ship, Diego’s beliefs are challenged.

Diego and the Rangers of the Vastlantic gives the reader a glimpse of the struggles others faced during different eras, which gives the story interest. The story doesn’t just focus on how boys and girls often do not understand each other, but also how people from different cultures can also have conflict.

Although the story is full of action and has an epic battle scene, the violence is not described in great detail. Instead, sights and sounds are left to the reader’s imagination. Stunning illustrations enhance the story and help bring the new world to life. Diego and the Rangers of the Vastlantic is a story about friendship, family, and seeing others in a new way. In the end, Diego learns that powerful weapons are not the key to keeping his world safe.

Sexual Content

  • Two boys have a sparring match and the winner gets a kiss from Paige. One of the boys says, “Sadly for you, only one lovely lady will get to know the thrill of these lips.” Later the winner describes the kiss, “But it wasn’t exactly a kiss. More like an attack on my face. Her lips were, like, strong.”

Violence

  • Diego and a group are cornered by a bully and his gang. Diego “Slammed Fish across the face with it (skateboard) and a girl ‘judo flipped’ a boy to the floor.”
  • A rebel group attacks a power plant and kidnap about a dozen engineers. “A marine lay on the floor nearby, unmoving . . . Shots. More gunshots. Fists colliding, the thump of bodies hitting the floor.” During the attack, a man holds a sword against Diego’s father’s throat.
  • Rebels attack a boat carrying some of the engineers’ families. “More pops. Splintering cracks. . . The gunfire seemed to come from everywhere . . . Bullets zinged past Diego’s head.” Diego’s mother shoots the rebel’s boat and it explodes.
  • When trying to escape from dinosaurs, Diego crashes his gravity board on a cliff. “The beast began to throw their massive bodies against the wall, trying to dislodge him.” Diego is rescued.
  • The rebels attack the pirate ship and the battle plays out over an entire chapter. The battle is not described in graphic detail.
  • The pirates, trying to save the engineers, attack the rebel’s base. The attack happens over several chapters. Diego shoots at one of the bad guys. When someone is injured, the description jumps in time, which allows the reader to imagine what happened. One of the characters is killed, but his death is not described.
  • When someone calls Diego a “clock mongrel,” Diego’s father hits him. “George spun and crumpled to the floor.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • A boy “sucked on his cigarette, the end glowing. . .”
  • The pirate captain is seen asleep with a half-empty bottle of vodka and Diego assumes he is drunk.

Language

  • Profanity is used rarely, but includes bastards, crap, crud, damn, hell, holy crap, and pisses.
  • When Lucy is saved from a dinosaur, she said, “Oh my God, I thought I was done for!” She uses this phrase twice.
  • When Diego finds out that pirates have been hired to find his father and the other engineers, Diego said, “Hell, I should be allowed to go before some hired guns.”
  • When Diego tells his friend about the pirates, his friend replies, “bloody hell!”
  • The rebel group is referred to as “bastards.”
  • When Paige makes a meal, the available food is referred to as “nasty crap.”
  • According to Diego, one of the girls acts like “everything I do pisses her off.”

Supernatural

  • Diego and his father have “the Maker’s Sight,” which allows them to see how different machine parts work together. “It shows me a series of images that allow me to make or fix anything.”
  • Diego wills baby turtles to surround Lucy. He explains how he did it. “It’s more like I can send them a thought, feeling, or image, and they seem to . . . act on it. It’s like hypnosis, I think.”
  • When describing “the Maker’s Sight,” Diego’s friend said, “You sound like one of those spiritual mediums we have back in London, communicating with the dead through their crystal balls.”

Spiritual Content

  • During a battle, the pirate captain said, “A prayer to your god of choice might also be helpful.”

The Last Kids on Earth

When the monster apocalypse hit Jack’s town, the thirteen-year-old retreated to his tree house. Everyone Jack knows has either run away or been zombified. Jack has been living in his tree house, which he’s armed to the teeth with catapults and a mote. Living on Oreos and Mountain Dew, Jack spends his time playing video games and scavenging stores.

Jack realizes that he can’t handle zombies, Winged Wretches, and Vine Thingies alone. He goes out to search for his best friend, Quint. Along the way he finds a team comprised of a reformed bully named Dirk, a pet monster, and a girl named June (who becomes Jack’s love interest).

Surviving a monster apocalypse will be difficult; however, life gets more dangerous when the intelligent gargantuan menace known as the Blarg sets his sights on Jack. He will need his entire team to defeat the monster.

Told from Jack’s point of view, the monster apocalypse comes to life with humor. Jack’s desire to care for his friends is clear. When Jack searches for June in the hopes of rescuing her, he discovers that she is a strong character that doesn’t need a knight in shining armor. Black and white illustrations add to the story. For a book filled with monsters, the story is more fun than frightening. Packed with action, The Last Kids on Earth will engage readers from the first page to the last.

Sexual Content

  • June Del Toro is Jack’s “love interest”. When introducing her, Jack says, she has “legs that just won’t quit (no idea what that means, I’ve heard it in a movie. I guess her legs are resilient?)”
  • Jack finds June in the school building. “In the dim light, I can make out that it’s June. Hey, I just used ‘make out’ and ‘June’ in the same sentence. Go me!”
  • Jack and his friend discuss if it is possible to “call dibs” on a girl.

Violence

  • A monster tries to smash Jack. The battle is described over several pages. “The monster’s massive fist pounds the roof until it cracks like thin ice. I trip, tumble back, and land hard on my bony butt .” When the monster smiles, he reveals “an army of dirty fangs, with chunks of flesh between each tooth.” When Jack hits the monster over the head, the monster drops him and Jack gets free.
  • A monster grabs the school bus. “The monster tilted the bus so the back pointed toward the sky. We all pinballed, plummeting down the aisle, smashing against the seats, backpacks flying through the air.” Jack and his best friend escape. The fate of the other occupants on the bus is not mentioned.
  • Zombies come after Jack. The zombie’s “throat is missing—just a bunch of gnarly old flesh there. He comes at me, practically jumping.” Jack whacks the zombie in the face with a hockey stick.
  • A monster eats a zombie. “He roars and shoves the undead thing into his mouth. As he chews, the sound of the poor zombie’s snapping ones echoes across the empty suburban street.”
  • A flying monster almost gest Jack. Dirk saves him. “Dirk hurls the Winged Wretch into the closest building . . . The monster lets off a pained howl, then flies off into the distance. . . “
  • A Blarg attacks. “Blarg’s like a tank, crushing cars and stomping shopping carts beneath his feet.” Jack and Dir use butter to make the monster crash.
  • June throws tennis balls at the zombies, who used to be her teachers. Later, the zombies attack the kids and there is a fight that is complete with illustrations. The fight goes on for several pages.
  • The Blarg attacks the kids. Jack uses a sling shot to fling an acid capsule into the Blarg’s eye. “A demonic howl erupts from Blarg’s lungs. He paws at his face, trying to wipe away the sizzling chemical mixture.” When the Blarg chases the kids, they throw a big-screen TV at him. The battle against the Blarg last for three chapters. Jack kills the Blarg with a “Louisville Slicer.”  The monster “howls. I’m dangling from the blade, gripping tight, as the monster’s legs give out and he comes crashing down.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • Jack calls a monster a jerk. Later he thinks, “I hate jerks—whether they’re monster jerks or zombie jerks or just regular human jerks.”
  • Jack says “crud” several times. When a monster tries to hit Jack, he thinks, “oh crud.” When the monster is looking for Jack, he says, “holy crud.”
  • Dirk calls Jack a dork.

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

The Last Kids on Earth and the Zombie Parade

A strange shrieking. Disappearing Zombies. New monsters appearing. Jack and his three friends keep hearing an eerie shrieking that summons the zombies. They are determined to discover where the zombies are going. Along the way, they encounter a giant Wormungulous, a pizza parlor monster hideout, an ancient evil who destroys worlds, and a stereo system that is totally the bomb.

The mystery of the strange shrieking isn’t the only problem Jack is facing. As a foster kid, Jack never had the chance to make friends. The monster apocalypse changed that. Now that he has a family, he wonders if he can trust them to stay alive on their own. He worries about all of the what-ifs—what if they get hurt? Or eaten? Or chopped up? Or zombified? Can Jack learn to trust his friends and allow them to help him stay safe?

In the end, Jack realizes that “Friends are important. Family is important. . . But even a post-apocalyptic action hero can’t keep them safe all the time.” He also learns that not all monsters are wicked and that battling together is the only way to defeat evil.

The Last Kids on Earth and the Zombie Parade is told in the same humorous tone as the first book in the series. Each of the kids is given unique talents and is shown to be strong in different ways. The Last Kids on Earth and the Zombie Parade will be a hit with readers of all ages.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • A Wormungulous lives in the mall and chases the kids. Jack hits the monster with a boomerang. “There’s a BLAST as smoke bombs and bang snaps and sparklers explode. The monster jerks to the left, veers band to the right. . . “ Jack and Quint are able to escape.
  • Later the Womungulous finds the kids and gives chase. Jack sticks the monster with a blade. “The monster shrieks in pain and its thick tail whips into me . . . I slam into the side of PacSun.” A man-monster pushes the kids out of the way.
  • A Hairy-Eyeball Monster attacks the Jack and Quint. The monster fires quills at the kids. One of the quills pins Quill to a headstone.
  • Zombies follow a strange shrieking noise. The kids follow, trying to figure out where the zombies are going, they see “undead bodies soar through the air like they’ve been launched from a catapult . . . We watch as limp zombie bodies pound the cement like mortar shells.” The zombie’s brains had been sucked out.
  • A Winged Wretch attacks. “The monster’s razor-sharp talons grab the zombie by the shoulders . . . the Winged Wretch beats its wing and thrust upward, into the sky.”
  • The kids find strange insects that combine to make a huge creature.  “. . . The insects begin to gather themselves. Amassing, assembling, joining together to form something nightmarish . . . I try to run, but the horror in front of me is too much . . .” Dirk saves Jack.
  • The zombies follow a strange shrieking sound. “As each zombie stumbles into the clearing, the tree’s branches move and shift. The branches snap and reach down in a series of chilling, herky-jerky movements. . . The branches open at the end, like ferocious wooden mouths—and they inhale the zombies.”
  • The Wormungulous chases Jack into a cage. “It’s wrapping around the cage like an oversized, ultra-awful anaconda . . . I feel like I’m in the trash compactor in Star Wars.” The monster’s energy runs out and Jack realizes that the Wormungulous has a festering wound and needs help.
  • Thrull, a giant monster, grabs Jack and throws him through the treehouse wall. “Wood splinters and shatters. A second later I crash-land into a pile of leaves.” When Dirk tries to help Jack, “Thrull backhands him—a slap that sends Dirk sprawling into Rover so that they both land in a heap.” Thrull puts the kids in a cage and takes them to the Tree of Entry. When Thrull is eaten by the tree, he turns into a monster.
  • The kids unite with monsters to defeat Thrull the Tree Beast. The battle is described over several pages. Jack is swallowed by Thrull the Tree Beast. “Thrull the Tree Beast shrieks! Wood snaps and cracks around me. At my feet, jutting out of the barrel, the bottle rocket burns . . . The trunk of the tree shatters completely. . . My body is rocked—a title wave of explosive energy rips through me, hurling me from the inside of the tree.” In the end, Jack is saved when the kids defeat Thrull the Tree Beast with weed killer and bottle rockets.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • The children are tricked into completing a bestiary. “I have filled the bestiary with magical energy. When the bestiary is full, the essence of the creatures inside will transform the book into a key.” The key will be used to let an ancient monster into the world, which wants to feed on others.
  • Thrull plants vines that turn into a Tree of Entry. The tree feeds an ancient monster. Trull must complete an incantation in order to bring the ancient monster to this world.
  • Thrull sacrifices himself to the tree. “He cackles like a mad, giggling demon and gives me a final look before his eyes shut and her roars, ‘TAKE ME.’” The Viney-Thinks eat Thrull.

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

The Last Kids on Earth and the Nightmare King

Life couldn’t get much better for 13-year-old Jack Sullivan. He eats Twinkie sandwiches for breakfast, lives in a cool treehouse, has a hoard of monster friends, and battles zombies. Jack loves his life with his friends and wouldn’t change a thing about it.

Then Jack and his friends discover they may not be the last kids on earth. When a human voice comes from a radio, everyone except for Jack is excited to discover that others have survived the zombie apocalypse. June and the others hope to be reunited with their parents, but Jack is afraid that finding others will lead to his friends forgetting about him. Jack goes on a quest to prove that their life is crazy, fun, and perfect.

As jack creates crazy fun activities for his friends, a monstrous Nightmare King hunts Jack and his friends.  Jack soon learns that an ancient evil will use any method necessary to gain Jack’s loyalty and help him come into Jack’s world.

The Last Kids on Earth and The Nightmare King is another action-packed book that will keep readers entertained. New complications and new monsters are introduced to keep the plot interesting. The story shows a diverse group of friends who work together to defeat monsters. Although each character may seem stereotypical at first—the brainiac, the bully, the damsel—each character is fully developed and reveal that a person cannot be put into a category. For example, June is not a damsel in distress, but a strong girl who is capable of contributing to the group.

Although there is violence, the kids spend most of their time running from the monsters. The battle scenes contain humor and are not frightening. In the end, the story reminds readers that it often takes both kids and monsters to defeat evil.

Sexual Content

  • June and Jack are playing a game. June asks Jack, “Which prize would you like honey?”  Jack knows she is teasing him, “but I don’t care; I like hearing her call me honey—it makes my belly region warm.”

Violence

  • Zombies attack the group. Dirk uses his strength to grab the zombies and “corpses catapulted.”
  • A King Wretch swoops and tries to grab Jack. “I smack into the street, flipping and flopping like a fish. My nose cracks against my knee, and I immediately feel blood bubbling inside my nostrils.” The monster grabs Rover, “dragging Rover across the pavement. The sound of pained scraping fills my ears while dread floods my stomach.”
  • A Scrapken (an octopus-like creature who lives in the junk yard) uses his tentacles to try to smash the kids. Instead, the Scrapken hits a wall and Zombies rush into the junk yard. “Thankfully, the next tentacle swing slams into a tire pile, and about nine hundred ninety-nine pounds of rubber plow into the zombies. Some are knocked aside, and others are sent pinwheeling through the air.”
  • In order to get away from zombies, Jack hides in a car. Before the zombies can get to Jack, the Scrapken picks up the car. “It’s chocking the metal frame like an anaconda—tightening and squeezing and crushing!” Then the Scrapken throws the car. Jack has “aches and pains and bruises, but nothing major.”
  • The King Wretch saves Jack from Zombies. “With one massive, snapping chomp, the King Wretch devours a dozen zombies. A simple swallow, sucking them down.” The King Wretch then grabs Jack. “His talons punch me square in the chest. I hit the cold floor and the claws tighten, digging into my shoulders. Hot saliva drips from the King Wretch’s fangs and splashes against my cheek.” The King Wretch then hypnotizes Jack.
  • While riding a rollercoaster, The King Wretch grabs Jack. “The flying beast snaps out with his talons, tearing into my hoodie and knocking me back.”  Jack’s hoodie tears and, “I plummet downward for a short moment, and then all I feel is PAINFUL AWFUL TREE-LIM-BREAKING-SMASHING ON MY BONES!” Jacks friends come to save him and there is a battle that last over several chapters. In the end the King Wretch is eaten by the Scrapken. “Slithery serpent sounds and then, at last, the King Wretch goes silent. The Scrapken hugs him anaconda tight, squeezing, crushing, and then they disappear beneath the scrap, into the ground . . .”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • Jack occasionally says “crud.”

Supernatural

  • The King Wretch hypnotizes Jack and gives him visions of what the future may be like. When the King Wretch looks into Jack’s eyes, “Soda bubbles in my brain. . . I feel like a tornado of terrible energy whirls past me. Through me... and then everything is altered”

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

Sisters of Glass

Halan, the heir to the Magi Kingdom, is different. Unlike every royal before her, she has no magical powers. Her parents fear that without magical powers, she will be unable to protect herself against a dangerous rebellion that is festering. Halan, on the other hand, is certain that she has nothing to fear and that her father will be able to reunite the Magi Kingdom in peace.

Nalah, a glassblower’s daughter, is an outcast among her peers. In New Hadar, she must hide her magical powers because magic is outlawed. Despite her efforts, her power is growing, and she is fighting the battle to control it. When an old family friend appears, Nalah begins to wonder if using magic is the only way to improve her and her father’s lives.

Two girls’ lives come crashing together when Nalah steps through a magical mirror that takes her to the Magi Kingdom. Each girl must overcome their fears and learn to trust each other before both of their worlds are shattered.

Full of magic and suspense, Sisters of Glass is a new series that is best suited for more advanced readers.  At the beginning of the book, the plot is complicated and confusing. The chapters begin with a history of each girl’s world and alternate between each girl’s point of view. Changing between points of view may be difficult for younger or struggling readers. The story also has graphic violence and the king kills several people in an effort to gain their magical powers. The death scenes may be disturbing, especially when Nalah watches her father die and then is stuck in the dungeon with his dead body.

Unlike most stories, Sisters of Glass, does not have a romantic interest. The platonic relationship between Nalah and her friend Marcus is refreshing and endearing. Readers will be able to connect to Nalah as she struggles with being obedient to her father. Nalah’s strong personality and her loyalty make her a character that readers can look up to. Unlike Nalah, Halan comes off as a bratty princess who thinks that she knows best. Even when her actions endanger others, her remorse is almost nonexistent. The contrast between the two girls is interesting, but Nalah is the character that readers will come to love.

There are several messages in the story. One message is treating everyone—no matter his or her station—with respect. This message ties in with the message of bringing peace to a kingdom. Only with justice, understanding, and cooperation can peace ever be realized.

Sexual Content

  • When Nalah meets a boy, her friend says, “He likes you,” and then makes a kissy noise.
  • Each world contains a person who is a tawam. Nalah is Halan’s tawam; however, they have different fathers. They discuss which of the two has a biological father that they don’t know about. Nalah wonders, “Could it be true? Could Zachary Tam have been my real father?”
  • Halan sees her mother kiss a man who is not her father. “ . . . He was leaning into her mother, his lips pressed to hers.” Later she discovers that this man is her biological father.

Violence

  • A metalworker makes a magic circlet. To demonstrate its power, the metalworker puts the circlet on a servant, which causes “the servant to cry out in unbearable pain and crumple to the floor, clutching at the metal around his head.”
  • Nalah’s father is attacked. “Mr. Bardak doubled over and Tam turned and brought his fist up in a swing that caught Nalah’s father across the temple, making him stagger. His knees bent and he fell to the floor.”
  • A man uses a mirror to travel to another world and kill another man. “He silently unclasped the sheath, raised the blade above his head, and brought it down into the back of the old Tam’s neck. . . The rumpled man didn’t make a sound. He spasmed once and fell forward off the chair onto the wooden floor, the papers by his feet scattering like a flock of started doves.”
  • Halan is kidnapped. When she is kidnapped, a cloak is thrown over her head. Later, she is tied up. She tricks a boy into untying her binds, and then “she brought her arm around in a wild swing, and her balled fist struck him hard on the side of the head. He reeled, and she reached up and grabbed his shirt, pulling him down to the floor so his head hit the stone with a horrifying thunk. He lay still.”
  • Nalah goes to the dungeon. “There were sounds coming from the murk. Crying sounds, wails of pain and distress, the low chatter of angry voices, the odd rattle of chains or clang of metal against metal.”
  • A guard throws Marcus to the ground and draws his sword. Nalah grabs the sword, and “suddenly the sword bent under her hand like it was made of clay.” Nalah’s glass bird swoops down and attacks the soldier; Marcus and Nalah get away.
  • In order to return to the palace, Halan must get away from her captors, so she “scooped up a chunk of sandstone, and clunked him on the back of the head . . . Marcus slumped to the ground with a groan.”
  • The king goes to Nalah’s world and kills several people’s tawams so that the tawams in his world will gain more power. Their deaths are not described.
  • The king kills Nalah’s father. “The king struck like a snake. . . A metal ball, about the size of a plum, flew from inside his flowing sleeve and struck Nalah’s father in the forehead. It stuck there, and immediately crackled with tiny fingers of white lightning, sending them climbing all across his body. Amir Bardak’s eyes grew wide with surprise, and his arms and legs spasmed uncontrollably . . . Nalah’s father went limp and fell forward, lifeless in the dirty straw.”
  • The king attempts to hang Nalah. An old man throws an orb at the executioner, “sending out a plume of blue smoke that curled around his foot like the tentacle of a sea monster, dragging him off stage and engulfing him in a pulsating cocoon of smoke.”
  • There is a battle between the common people and the king’s soldiers. The action takes place over a chapter but is not described in detail. When a guard attacks Nalah with a sword, a glass bird, “raked them [his talons] across the guard’s face,” saving her. The king grabs his daughter and threatens to kill her, but Nalah saves her.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Halan goes to a bazaar where two men walk by “drunkenly.” At the end of the night, very few people are still outside, but there are a “few, argumentative drunks.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Thaumas have magical powers that allow them to make things with one element—glass, metal, tapestry, wood, etc.
  • Several of the characters use a mirror to travel to another world. When Nalah goes through the mirror, “it felt like she didn’t have hands—or any physical body at all. She felt herself hanging, suspended in an in-between place, wonderstruck and trembling with fear.”
  • Nalah has several magical powers. She can make metal bend. When she touches a tapestry, she has a vision of the events depicted in the tapestry. “. . . The tapestry in front of her was coming to life, as if every individual thread had a mind of its own.”
  • Nalah’s captors put a Veil of Strangers on her.  The veil changes her appearance. When she tries to remove the veil, “it squeezed tight around her temples, her head filling with throbbing pain.”
  • “Some people exist in both worlds, like twins—except they call them ‘tawams.’ . . . there’s a mirror version of me living here.”

Spiritual Content

  • None

 

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