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Aug 14, 2024 | 
kirkusreviews.com | Tom Phillips |Dav Pilkey |Elinor Teele |Ben Whitehouse
Is this the end? Well, no…the series will stagger on through at least one more scheduled sequel. Sure signs that the creative wells are running dry at last, the Captain’s ninth, overstuffed outing both recycles a villain (see Book 4) and offers trendy anti-bullying wish fulfillment. Not that there aren’t pranks and envelope-pushing quips aplenty.
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Jul 29, 2024 | 
kirkusreviews.com | James Patterson |Dav Pilkey |Elinor Teele |Ben Whitehouse
by James Patterson ; adapted by Adam Rau ; illustrated by Phillip Tajall ; color by Ray Kao ‧Lackluster visuals hamper this adaptation, though readers will still root for its kid detective protagonist. Ali Cross, the son of bestselling author Patterson’s Detective Alex Cross, finds new life in graphic novel format. Ali’s friend Gabe Qualls has disappeared; several days later, someone breaks into the Cross home.
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May 27, 2024 | 
calitreview.com | Claire Tomalin |Elinor Teele
Charles Dickens: A LifePenguin Press, 576 pp. CLR [rating:4.0]Charles Dickens: Puck EverlastingIn my own, admittedly, rather odd version of heaven, God reserves a special place for biographers. I picture it much like a Pompeiian garden – a statue-strewn lawn where David McCullough and Doris Kearns Goodwin can lounge around in togas and quiz John Adams on his medical history.
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May 4, 2024 | 
kirkusreviews.com | Beth Lincoln |Claire Powell |Elinor Teele |Ben Whitehouse
An amorally charming hero stars in this comically flamboyant heist mystery. The over-the-top Swift family might be able to reconcile with their cousins—if art theft doesn’t interfere. In this second series entry, as delightfully hilarious and witty as the first, Shenanigan Swift learns she has family in Paris—the Martinet cousins—with whom the English Swifts have long been feuding.
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Apr 4, 2023 | 
kirkusreviews.com | Elinor Teele
SWIM TEAM by Johnnie Christmas ; illustrated by Johnnie Christmas ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 17, 2022 Leaving Brooklyn behind, Black math-whiz and puzzle lover Bree starts a new life in Florida, where she’ll be tossed into the deep end in more ways than one. Keeping her head above water may be the trickiest puzzle yet.
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Mar 30, 2023 | 
calitreview.com | Elinor Teele
Making a Western in Hollywood today seems to be the equivalent of adapting a Jane Austen novel – it’s a beautiful way to shine up your film résumé without losing your street credibility. Gone are the days of studio Westerns, churned out at a frightening speed and vastly different in their approaches. John Ford and John Wayne are dead. Tombstone and Dodge City have become ghost towns and finally amusement parks.
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Mar 7, 2023 | 
kirkusreviews.com | Jennifer Nielsen |Dav Pilkey |Elinor Teele
by Jennifer A. Nielsen ; illustrated by Jennifer A. Nielsen ‧ A young girl stows away on the Titanic. Twelve-year-old narrator Hazel Rothbury arrives in Southampton on April 10, 1912, only to discover she doesn’t have enough money for a ticket. Hazel is bound for factory work in America, leaving behind the family farm. She sneaks aboard inside another passenger’s trunk, and a young crewman finds her an empty cabin to stow away in. Sylvia, a first-class passenger Hazel’s age, and Mrs.
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Feb 14, 2023 | 
kirkusreviews.com | Raina Telgemeier |Elinor Teele |J.N. Kelly
by J.N. Kelly ‧ A mother and daughter keep secrets from one another in this World War II–era story. Being a lefty with a devastating submarine delivery, 14-year-old Wisconsinite Millie Bauer is not only good enough on the mound to play with the boys in sandlot games, but has caught the eye of the local high school’s baseball coach.
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Feb 14, 2023 | 
kirkusreviews.com | Dav Pilkey |Elinor Teele |Ben Whitehouse
A venerated author interweaves an archaeological mystery—the 1952 discovery in Germany of an adolescent mummified in a peat bog two millennia ago—with the stories it inspired her to write. The book opens by providing scientific and historical context from similar finds elsewhere and explaining how peat bogs preserve bodies and the way radiocarbon dating works.
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Jan 28, 2023 | 
calitreview.com | Brian Kellow |Elinor Teele
Pauline Kael: A Life in the DarkViking, 432 pp. CLR [rating:3.5]The Admirably Unpleasant Pauline KaelThe other night I mentioned to a family friend that I was reviewing a biography of Pauline Kael, the famous 20th century film critic. “Oh, I met her,” he said airily. On closer examination, he told me that when he was a dean of a rather prestigious university, he had tried to interest her in coming to speak to students.
