(++++) NURSING A RHYME

Jack B. Ninja. By Tim McCanna. Illustrated by Stephen Savage. Orchard Books/Scholastic. $16.99.

     Just when it seems that nursery rhymes are no longer much fun for today’s young people, along comes Tim McCanna with a brand-new take on the old “Jack be nimble” rhyme – one that, accompanied by delightfully off-kilter drawings by Stephen Savage, shows there is still plenty of life in those old bits of nonsense. Actually, nursery rhymes were generally very well-disguised social comments, dating to a time when criticism of the powers-that-be could result in penalties up to and including death – so people whose names are long lost found ways of making fun of and critiquing feudal society through rhymes that only seemed to mean nothing. Nowadays, though, the nonsensical elements are all that anyone pays attention to, and in all the excitement of our video-saturated, technologically savvy age, who has time for that sort of wordplay?

     Well, McCanna and Savage certainly do, and so will kids lucky enough to add this picture book to their collection. The book starts with a small, completely round-headed ninja, his eyes the only part of him that is visible, peeking out from behind vaguely Oriental architecture – and then the narrative itself begins, on the next page: “Jack B. Ninja! Jack, be quick!/ Jack, jump over the bamboo stick!” That is just what Jack does, running toward – where? He is on “a secret mission” amid pagodas, atop walls and roofs in a place where faceless, spear-carrying guards march past in formation. What exactly is the mission? It involves getting past the guards, and then, “Jack B. Ninja keeps his cool./ Dips into the garden pool.” And he swims to the shore, then quietly sneaks into “a bandit cave” to find a “stolen treasure chest.”

     There is plenty more excitement to come: a trip wire drops Jack into a trap, and the bandits are after him – he needs to use his grappling hook and rope to escape. But there is something rather unthreatening about the three bandits: Jack jumps on their heads, from one to the next to the third, until he grasps the rope and flees – with the bandits watching from a rooftop as Jack “brings the prize to Ninja Master.” But – oh, no! The bandits pursue Jack, and there is about to be a big fight, when…everything changes. And that is the delight of Jack B. Ninja: it starts as a stylized adventure story but eventually becomes a wonderful family celebration. Of what? It turns out that the whole dress-up activity is in recognition of Jack’s birthday – with, sure enough, a suitable cake: “Jack B. Ninja flips and kicks./ Cartwheels over the candlesticks.” And everybody celebrates, then heads home over the rooftops to leave behind one slice of cake that remains visible just as the sun comes up.

     Gently surreal, warmly amusing and just silly enough to keep young readers and pre-readers interested, Jack B. Ninja keeps the cadence of the “Jack be nimble” nursery rhyme, preserves some elements of the original (such as those candlesticks near the end), and offers wonderfully cartoony illustrations that bounce all the ninja moves and ninja determination all over the book’s pages. A short, simple and thoroughly amusing retelling/reorientation of the even shorter “Jack be nimble” original, Jack B. Ninja is enough fun so that it may inspire parents to grab a book of original nursery rhymes and see whether contemporary children can in fact be captivated by these very old “nonsense” stories to the same extent that the parents themselves surely were when they were kids.

(++++) A MULTIPLICITY OF FEARS

We Are Where the Nightmares Go and Other Stories. By C. Robert Cargill. Harper Voyager. $26.99.

     Give the man credit: he finds weirdness everywhere and horror just about anyplace. The 10 tales in C. Robert Cargill’s We Are Where the Nightmares Go and Other Stories have settings ranging from Appalachia to Australia to an anteroom of Hell, with characters from ordinary humans to Cretaceous-era dinosaurs and things even more outré than that. Not everything in the book works, but even the stories that do not really gel have their intriguing moments, and Cargill’s style is both involving enough and variable enough to make it worthwhile to stay with a narrative that does not quite seem successful – because of the possibility that he will pull the proverbial rabbit out of the proverbial hat. And sometimes he does. But it tends to be in small, bloody pieces.

     There is plenty of fear and horror in this book, but most of the stories are not written only to elicit a frisson of terror, and are the better for striving for something beyond shivers. Take The Last Job Is Always the Hardest, for example. It is about a man named Brian who is about to blow up a train and kill 238 people, and who suddenly encounters someone who knows exactly what he is planning and has no intention of stopping him because he – the other man – has a job that is “much bigger than that. Much bigger.” Or Jake and Willy at the End of the World, in which two stereotypical good ol’ boys contemplate the incipient apocalypse with banter and beer. Or the title story, which starts with a little girl entering one of those magical portals so dear to authors of children’s stories – but not for a grand adventure: “No one talks about the other children, the children who walk through basement doors and rabbit holes never to return. …Their adventures are not the things of pageants and matinees. Rather, they are the things we try not to think of, the things instead we dream about when we would rather be dreaming of something else.”

     Those three stories, packed with eeriness and oddity, are thoroughly successful by virtue of not pulling out all the traditional stops of horror writing. But Cargill is quite capable of writing full-fledged terror tales when he wishes: The Town That Wasn’t Anymore is a genuinely scary ghost/zombie story about angry, vengeance-obsessed dead miners whose spirits must be contained, whatever the cost – and the cost is very high indeed. But pulling out all the stops does not always work in this collection: Hell They Call Him, the Screamers, is intended as a nightmare tale along the lines of Harlan Ellison’s 1967 I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream, but Cargill here lacks Ellison’s horrific élan and makes the mistake of not actually setting the story anywhere – it becomes a tale of monstrous brutality without even a soupçon of explanatory justification. And A Clean White Room (co-written with Scott Derrickson), which strives for depth as well as fright in its portrait of an Iraq war veteran assigned to punish the damned for a year in order to find his own way to peace, goes off the rails because it is never quite clear why this punisher has so much difficulty doling out the suffering that he is required to deliver, yet that “why” is supposed to be the core of the story’s intended moral complexity.

     Other pieces here succeed in some ways and not in others. As They Continue to Fall is a rather jaggedly written story about a man who hunts evil angels, unless everything he does is only happening in his own unbalanced mind. Hell Creek, the dinosaur tale, has a fascinating concept – an attempt by individual dinosaurs to survive for a bit longer just as their world is coming to an end – but ultimately founders in its weak attempt to anthropomorphize the creatures enough to try to elicit empathy for the unlikely alliance of two herbivores of different species.

     And then there are two tales that really work only for readers of earlier material by Cargill and others. I Am the Night You Never Speak Of is reprinted from a collection called Midian Unmade, a group of stories set in the Nightbreed universe created by Clive Barker. It takes place after the destruction of Midian – and without knowing what that means, and understanding what the whole Midian concept entails, readers will find Cargill’s narrative disjointed and puzzling. And The Soul Thief’s Son, a novella that concludes this collection and is the longest entry in it, is a “further adventures” story focusing on Colby Stevens, protagonist of Cargill’s Queen of the Dark Things. It is certainly possible to read this story, and enjoy parts of it, without knowing much about Colby, but the tale gains immeasurably for readers familiar with the earlier novel. Cargill himself is clearly aware of this: he includes a glossary after the story “for those new to Colby’s adventures or for those in need of a refresher.” But the nine glossary entries really do not help much and, indeed, raise as many questions as they answer. On balance, We Are Where the Nightmares Go and Other Stories is an uneven collection by an author who generally writes very well even when specifics of his plots are handled in a somewhat-less-than-articulate way. His style in these stories sometimes underlines and enhances their effectiveness. At other times, it almost, almost, conceals the tales’ lack of clarity.

(++++) THE POWER OF THE SOLO

Biber: Mystery Sonatas. Christina Day Martinson, violin; Martin Pearlman, harpsichord and organ; Michael Unterman, cello; Michael Leopold, theorbo and guitar. Linn Records. $19.99 (2 CDs).

Bach: Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin. Thomas Bowes, violin. Navona. $14.99 (3 CDs).

Prokofiev: Sonata for Solo Violin; Timo Andres: Violin Sonata; Libby Larsen: Blue Piece; Judith Lang Zaimont: Grand Tarantella; Rain Worthington: Jilted Tango; Michael Daugherty: Viva; Benjamin Ellin: Three States at Play. Moonkyung Lee, violin; Martha Locker, piano. Navona. $14.99.

     One of the absolute marvels of Baroque music by one of the most innovative composers of the time, Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber’s Mystery Sonatas are musically enthralling, emotionally captivating and spiritually uplifting in a way more usually associated with Bach – who was not born until a decade after Biber wrote this music. Biber was a highly accomplished violinist, to such an extent that he stretched the bounds of violin performance capability in directions previously unheard-of. The word “stretched” can be taken literally: the Mystery Sonatas use scordatura tuning, tuning different from the standard one for the violin, and in some cases this requires stretching the strings (which were, of course, made of gut – which is quite stretchable). It also requires violinists to stretch their technique, since their fingerings in scordatura tuning do not produce the same notes as in traditional tuning. Just how differently Biber made the violin sound for these 15 sonatas is made clear by Christina Day Martinson in her splendid new performance on Linn Records: she opens each sonata by playing the specific four notes to which the violin is tuned for that particular work. The complexity of the tunings and the difficulties associated with them lead Martinson, a superb period-instrument player, to use multiple violins for this performance – a clever and instrument-and-string-sparing approach. There are scarcely enough superlatives to say how well Martinson’s handling of this magnificent music works. There are 15 sonatas because there are 15 Mysteries of the Rosary, and Biber clearly intended the sonatas to accompany Rosary devotions – probably as, in most cases, a generic aid to contemplation, since the sonatas have few direct connections to the scenes of Christ’s and Mary’s lives to which they are attached (each sonata is, in the sole surviving manuscript, preceded by an illustration of the relevant scene, all of which are reproduced in the booklet accompanying this performance). It is not necessary to be Catholic, or even particularly religious, to be uplifted by hearing this marvelous sonata cycle, more than two hours long, from start to finish. And it is almost impossible not to be enthralled by the different sounds that Biber uses scordatura tuning to have the violin produce and that Martinson brings out so beautifully: the brighter sounds of the first five sonatas (collectively, “The Joyful Mysteries”) contrast so strongly with the opening of the sixth, “The Agony in the Garden” (which starts the second set of five, “The Sorrowful Mysteries”) that it is almost impossible not to sit up and take astonished notice. And the final set of five sonatas, “The Glorious Mysteries,” is so bright and clear that it tells the story of Jesus’ resurrection and Mary’s assumption and coronation more effectively than any words can on their own. Martinson is at the forefront of a highly welcome trend in Baroque performance practice, which involves not only the scholarly rediscovery of correct instrumental use and technique but also – and equally important – the re-learning of the very intense emotions sought and elicited by Baroque composers in their compositions. Decades of dry performances of music of this era will not prepare listeners for the extraordinary intensity of feeling in the Mystery Sonatas and Martinson’s highly sensitive evocation of it. After the 15 sonatas, an extended concluding Passacaglia, which uses traditional violin tuning – also employed only in the very first sonata, “The Annunciation” – becomes a capstone that gives listeners a chance to breathe a monumental sigh of relief and to contemplate the amazing beauty and variety to which Biber and Martinson have exposed them. The members of Boston Baroque who accompany Martinson are one and all first-rate, thoughtful musicians whose involvement in Biber’s material is not only audible but also almost palpable. Indeed, this is music that one does not only hear: one feels it, and the feeling with which Martinson plays it underlines the devotional fervor that Biber surely intended to explore in his own time and that is here transferred beautifully and meaningfully to our own, far more secular age.

     There is also a great deal to admire in Thomas Bowes’ cycle for Navona of Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin, especially on the emotional scale: Bowes sees these works as essentially inward-looking and contemplative, and accordingly performs them with manifest sincerity and a greater sense of profundity than is usually accorded them in most of their movements (the astonishing Chaconne that ends the second Partita always excepted). The structure of this release is interesting: priced as a single CD, it includes three – most recordings put the material on two – and as a result, Bowes offers one sonata and its associated prelude per disc. This encourages thoughtful listening to the ways in which the pieces are (and are not) musically and emotionally comparable, and in particular lends some pleasantly upbeat conclusiveness to the third partita, which can in some readings come across as a rather lightweight end to the set of pieces. Here the third partita becomes an affirmative kind of “musical offering” after the third sonata, with its complex and highly extended second-movement fugue. Bowes also does a fine job throughout the works of emphasizing the way the more-rigid structure of the sonatas contrasts with and is complemented by the more-free-flowing approach of the partitas. What Bowes does not do is to offer a fully historically informed reading of the music. There is less ornamentation and more vibrato in these readings than historic practices would indicate, and there is compromise between the historic and the modern in Bowes’ choice of instrument: the violin dates to 1659 but has modern fittings, and only three of the four strings are gut. When Bowes’ communicative instincts take him in a direction different from what historically accurate performance would indicate, he goes with his feelings rather than the scholarship, as a result producing highly emotive readings that are not quite in line with the type of emotional connection that Bach would have sought. It is certainly possible to stick strictly to Baroque style and bring out the deepest possible emotions – Martinson’s handling of Biber shows that in the most exemplary way possible – but few performers are able to do this, and the hybrid approach used by Bowes is generally more congenial for those playing the music. It works well for listeners, too: Bowes’ interpretations here are heartfelt and come across feelingly, with warmth and in a suitably atmospheric manner. The beauty and profundity of these solo-violin works come through in many different ways in the many different versions of them available to listeners. Bowes’ treatment of the material, if not 100% authentic, is 100% sincere. And it is beautifully paced and played, providing a highly involving listening experience to which one can return repeatedly for added insights.

     The solo-violin pieces on a Navona CD featuring performances by Moonkyung Lee are scarcely at the level of the music of Biber and Bach, and Lee’s playing, while quite fine, does not have the deep-seated conviction and intensity of the performances by Martinson and Bowes – at least in the repertoire heard here. Three of the seven works on this (+++) disc are for solo violin: those by Prokofiev, Daugherty and Ellin. The Prokofiev and Ellin, which open and close the release, make for the most interesting material here and the best-contrasted: each is in three movements, the second being the most relaxed, and each is a fairly short (10-to-12-minute) work giving the violinist plenty of opportunities for display. Unsurprisingly, the tonal language of Ellin’s piece is more contemporary than that of Prokofiev, and Ellin’s work actually sounds more challenging to perform (Prokofiev’s was written as a study piece, albeit for highly talented violin students). Lee clearly relishes the showy aspects of both works and accepts the respite of the works’ middle movements as a necessary interlude: she seeks no particular depth, and in truth, neither composer offers much. The third violin-alone piece, Daugherty’s Viva, is a short showpiece that is all about display and that Lee tosses off with appropriate abandon. The remaining works here also keep the violin as the primary focus even though it is paired with the piano – which Martha Locker balances appropriately with Lee in all cases. The sonata by Andres somewhat recalls Prokofiev both in sound and in its comparative simplicity; there is also something rather Schubertian about it. Larsen’s Blue Piece is laid-back and pleasant, if rather forgettable. Zaimont’s Grand Tarantella comes across well, with the jauntiness to which the title points: here as elsewhere, Lee seems especially comfortable with and adept at dealing with bright, upbeat material. And Worthington’s Jilted Tango, another dance-inspired work, is a neatly superficial bit of musical lovemaking. Because of the Prokofiev, Ellis and Andres works, this CD does not come across as solely a collection of encore-like display pieces. But the comparative lightness of the three sonata serves to emphasize Lee’s apparent comfort with the lighter side of violin music and performance: because the material here lacks profundity (although certainly not all music must possess it), the disc as a whole provides little substantive to which a listener is likely to return repeatedly for psychological or emotional nourishment.

(++++) IMPRESSIONS AND FEELINGS

Debussy: Préludes for Piano, Books I and II (complete). Terry Lynn Hudson, piano. MSR Classics. $12.95 (2 CDs).

Debussy: Suite Bergamasque; Ballade; Pour le Piano; Arabesque No. 1; Images, Books I and II. Eliane Rodrigues, piano. Navona. $14.99.

Mother: A Musical Tribute. Elizabeth Joy Roe and Greg Anderson, pianos. SWR Music. $18.99.

     Although there is no musical reason to perform all 24 of Debussy’s Préludes for Piano as a set – unlike similar works by Bach and Chopin, Debussy’s do not follow a specific tonal sequence – the full grouping is a tour de force for pianists and produces an intriguingly involving effect on listeners who hear the works from start to finish, or at least listen to Book I straight through and subsequently to all of Book II. The connections among these works are subtle rather than structurally dictated – for example, the works in the first book, from 1910, are more directly impressionistic, while those in the second, from 1913, delve more deeply into strictly musical issues of their time, such as dissonances and tonal ambiguity. Terry Lynn Hudson’s exemplary reading of both books of Préludes, a two-CD set from MSR Classics that is being sold for the price of a single disc, is an excellent introduction to the music for anyone unfamiliar with it – and stands up very well against other recordings, for those who know the material already. Hudson is especially adept at gently evoking Debussy’s scenes of quietude and sadness, notably in Brouillards (“Mists,” which opens the second book) and La cathédrale engloutie (”The Sunken Cathedral,” tenth in the first book). Debussy’s piano music, generally speaking, is subtle and understated, and that is particularly true of these two pieces and several others in the Préludes. And this is precisely where Hudson excels. She does not over-sentimentalize these pieces and, indeed, does not over-interpret the ones that benefit from direct and straightforward presentation, such as La fille aux cheveux de lin (“The Girl with Flaxen Hair,” the eighth piece in the first book). If there is a single word that seems to describe both books of Préludes, it would be “fluidity” – of expression, or rhythm, of tempo, of coloration, of texture. Hudson is quite sensitive to this characteristic, with the result that her performance imparts a certain overarching connectedness among the works even in the absence of a predetermined relatedness through keys. Hudson also has a keen sense of wit and humor when those are called for, as in Général Lavine – eccentric (the cakewalk-like sixth piece in the second book). By any measure, these are neatly tied-up performances, both of individual pieces as miniatures and as an entire set of 24 little pianistic gems.

     Debussy’s piano music is also handled with style and sensitivity on a new Navona CD featuring Eliane Rodrigues. The contrasts among the six pieces in the two books of Images are particularly effective here. The books of Images date to 1905 and 1907 and are, like the two books of Préludes, somewhat different in focus, the first being more readily accessible and the second denser and more complex both to play and to hear. On the basis of this disc, Rodrigues sees Debussy as a composer whose piano music is filled with contrasts: she brings out the works’ differing moods strongly, again and again. Thus, the four movements of Suite Bergamasque (1890-1905) are filled with a mixture of feelings – and yes, the mix specifically appears in the third, longest and most familiar, Clair de lune, which for Rodrigues presents a feeling of being bereft and uncertain in the moonlight, not simply experiencing enjoyment of the beauties of the landscape below the bright orb. All the works here get sensitive, thoughtful treatment, from the earliest, Arabesque No. 1 (1888-1891) to the later Ballade (1890-1903) and Pour le Piano (1896-1903). The CD is a generous length, nearly an hour and a quarter, which explains a decision that is unlikely to please listeners who prefer the CD medium to online music: Rodrigues also offers a lovely, lilting and thoroughly enjoyable version of the Children’s Corner suite, but it is available only online – its 16 minutes would not quite have fit onto the CD with everything already on it. Listeners may decide for themselves whether they would have preferred to have something else omitted and Children’s Corner included on the disc, where it would have been the latest work offered (it dates to 1908). Even without the bonus, though, this is a CD that lovers of Debussy will enjoy, especially insofar as Rodrigues views some of the music, such as Clair de lune, in atypical ways.

     A new SWR Music recording featuring the Anderson & Roe piano duet offers two pianos and two pianists rather than one of each, but that is scarcely to the CD’s benefit, despite the performers’ excellent playing. The reason is that this is one of those “theme” discs and is also a very deliberate crossover recording – and is therefore only for people who accept and enjoy the topic (the disc’s title is “Mother: A Tribute”) and who also are comfortable with the rather weird juxtapositions that the performers offer. Listeners to this (+++) recording should be prepared to hear Dvořák (“Songs My Mother Taught Me”) immediately followed by an excerpt from Queen’s 1975 “A Night at the Opera,” succeeded by Rachmaninoff’s Suite No. 1 for Two Pianos, followed by a rendition of Simon & Garfunkel’s “Mrs. Robinson” – and so forth. There is Grieg’s “A Mother’s Grief” and then “What a Wonderful World” by Bob Thiele and George David Weiss – the juxtapositions of meaning are as strange here as are those of music. Schubert’s (perhaps inevitable) “Ave Maria” is followed by the Lennon/McCartney “Let It Be,” then the (definitely inevitable) Brahms “Lullaby,” and finally a version of the humming chorus from Madame Butterfly, in which the a cappella singing group Accent cooperates to produce a jazzy recasting of the music that is somewhat at odds with the emotional underpinnings of Puccini’s original. The point of this whole release is to mix genres in such a way as to fulfill the CD’s title, and also create a tribute to the pianists’ own mothers, whose preferences are partly responsible for the choice of works to record. That makes this a nice family project, for sure; and Elizabeth Joy Roe and Greg Anderson are both fine performers who seem to relish all the material and who handle the works with sensitivity and enthusiasm. Nevertheless, the disc is one of very limited appeal, because for listeners to enjoy it, they have to like these specific mother-oriented works in these specific arrangements, presented in this specific way. Only people who are closely in tune with or tuned into the pianists (so to speak) will be likely to appreciate this particular “tribute” CD and come to it as an audience with the same enthusiasm that Anderson and Roe bring to it as performers.

(++++) THE ANIMAL-KID CONNECTION

How Do Dinosaurs Learn to Read? By Jane Yolen. Illustrations by Mark Teague. Blue Sky Press/Scholastic. $16.99.

A Werewolf Named Oliver James. By Nicholas John Frith. Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic. $17.99.

Moo Moo & Mr. Quackers Present: What’s Cooking, Moo Moo? By Tim Miller. Balzer+Bray/HarperCollins. $17.99.

     Although it is a longstanding feature of kids’ picture books to have animals take the place of children and stand in for them during adventures ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous (and including the everyday), many authors continue to find new and clever ways of extending this convention and keeping it alive and lively. Jane Yolen and Mark Teague are particularly adept at this in their long-running series showing kids as dinosaurs – anatomically accurate dinosaurs (based on the latest scientific knowledge) doing distinctly un-dinosaur-like things in typical human-middle-class settings. This lets Yolen and Teague accentuate both kids’ bad behavior (in the early part of each book) and their good actions (in the later part of each entry). And Teague’s fanciful colors for the dinosaurs – very little is known about the colors that dinosaurs actually sported – enhance the presentations tremendously. The latest book in the series ends differently from earlier ones and becomes overtly instructive – an interesting twist. Yolen and Teague start out with typical enthusiasm and abandon in How Do Dinosaurs Learn to Read? A Kileskus misbehaves by using a book to bat a ball; a Brachyceratops plays book-throwing games with a cat and a dog; a hilariously overacting Amazonsaurus (one of the ultra-heavy, long-necked dinosaurs) is caught in mid-leap, having a temper tantrum that is about to lead to a book being crushed by her gigantic body; and so on. Human adults are sprinkled through the pages to react with suitable dismay to the antics of the kidosaurs: the Dryptosaurus sitting on the toilet in a thoroughly messed-up bathroom, reading a book called “Potty” as a parent stares at the mess all around, is a classic among Teague’s pictures. What is wonderful about this series is that even when things turn preachy later in each book, the dinosaur pictures are so much fun to see that the lessons go down easily: there is an irresistible picture of a mom about to turn out the light while a huge-billed, multicolored, vaguely birdlike Zhejiangopterus is still happily reading in bed. The final three pages here, instead of extending the story, display all 26 letters of the alphabet (capital and small) and give information on learning to read – complete with small dinosaur pictures as illustrations. That makes this particular book into a fine teaching tool for pre-readers and the earliest readers. And it neatly responds to the question in the book’s title: How Do Dinosaurs Learn to Read? The answer: with this book itself.

     There is nothing hyper-realistic in the illustrations for Nicholas John Frith’s A Werewolf Named Oliver James, because, after all, who really knows what a werewolf looks like? But if a child could turn into one on the way home from band practice, he might look just like Oliver James after his transformation – which turns the boy into a really cute and really huge-toothed version of the mythical wolf-human hybrid. Frith uses mostly dark colors in the book, implying without ever specifically saying that the full moon is what transforms Oliver James – who does not quite know what has happened to him, but is delighted to discover that he now has super-speed, super-strength and the ability to do super-leaps. He also has a problem: dinner is at 6:00, and he knows he has to be home by then, but buses will not stop for a werewolf, and trains, bikes and cars are not really options. So Oliver James heads for home on foot (or paw) – speedily, to be sure, despite the fact that it is now raining. The rain stops soon enough, but Oliver James still has a problem: should he be late and have his parents be upset, or should he just walk into the house in his werewolf form and risk scaring them, as he has scared all the other people he has encountered since his transformation? Might as well go in, he decides – and gets a surprise when his parents are not the slightest bit troubled or concerned about his werewolf form, having changed into werewolves themselves. The change lasts only overnight: the next morning, there is no full moon anymore and everyone has returned to human appearance. But now, at least, Oliver James knows why he changed – and kids who read this lighthearted and very amusingly illustrated book are likely to be frustrated when they find out that their parents have not given them any lunar transformational powers.

     Tim Miller’s restaurant-themed adventure of Moo Moo the cow and Mr. Quackers the duck may not be directly comparable to anything that human kids can do, but these two characters certainly mess things up as much as boys and girls would if they tried to run a restaurant. There is something especially clever in the design of Moo Moo & Mr. Quackers Present: What’s Cooking, Moo Moo? The book has a standard wraparound dust jacket, but unlike almost all such protective wrappers, this one is very different from the book covers that it conceals. Those covers show “The Daily Quack” (“price: a lot”), which features the cow and duck on the front page (the book’s front cover) and classified ads on the back page (the book’s back cover) – the ads asking for ballerinas (“no cows or ducks allowed”), offering a can of worms for sale, and more. And oh yes, the restaurant that Moo Moo and Mr. Quackers open turns out to be a can of worms. Yes, literally: worms are not officially on the menu, but they do turn up. What is on the menu is everything else, since the Moo Moo Special (“all my favorite foods mixed together, of course”) includes sardines, carrots, “Jell-O in a bag,” popcorn, mayonnaise, frozen fish, pineapple, cupcakes, watermelon, and a few other ingredients that turn out to be about as appetizing in combination as they sound. The restaurant is Moo Moo’s idea, paid for with the money from the long-suffering Mr. Quackers’ piggy bank, but after customers’ initial enthusiasm for trying something new, the project quickly collapses and the establishment has to be sold. To make up for everything and have a chance for the two friends to spend more time together, Moo Moo suggests a vacation – but as the last page of Miller’s book shows, matters are again going to get out of hand (or, for Mr. Quackers, out of wing) very, very soon. The cartoonish illustrations and overall silliness of the situations, added to the unexpected additional-but-related “Daily Quack” story, make this book a great deal of fun for kids who would never, ever think of making a huge mess of, say, the kitchen. Nope. Wouldn’t ever happen.

(++++) TALK TO THE ANIMALS

Pip Bartlett’s Guide to Sea Monsters. By Jackson Pearce. Illustrations by Maggie Stiefvater. Scholastic. $9.99.

Following Baxter. By Barbara Kerley. Harper. $16.99.

     The third Pip Bartlett adventure follows quite directly in the footsteps of the first two, but Pip Bartlett’s Guide to Sea Monsters has enough fun and mild mystery so it will not seem repetitious to readers of Pip Bartlett’s Guide to Magical Creatures and Pip Bartlett’s Guide to Unicorn Training. The underlying premise of all the books is that Pip can talk to animals, and if that seems like a magical ability, it should, since she talks to magical animals. Indeed, a lot of the fun of these books is reading about the magical animals that Jackson Pearce imagines and that Maggie Stiefvater neatly illustrates as if they are being discussed in a magical-creatures guidebook – whose existence more or less ties all the Pip adventures together. Pearce and Stiefvater make the magical critters just a step or two beyond real-world ones, helping kids relate to the imaginary animals and their behavior. In Pip Bartlett’s Guide to Sea Monsters, the title character is a “slimekraken,” a highly intelligent deep-sea creature more or less resembling real-world deep-sea krakens (probably giant squid). It is the keeping of a slimekraken in a tank for display and educational purposes, and its eventual release, that provide the mystery and drama of the book. But it is Pip’s ability to speak to the slimekraken and many other magical creatures that keeps matters entertaining and enjoyable. Other critters here are the “spinnerseal,” an adorable-looking, furry and very definitely seal-like creature that, among other things, helps Tomas – Pip’s timid, highly allergic, easily frightened and hypochondriacal best friend – learn a bit about swimming, which he has always been too frightened to try; eel-like “tubeknots” that live tangled together; hermit-crab-like “crabbels” that turn out to be able to put on theatrical productions; “Eastern sandmarchers,” birds resembling real-world sandpipers except that they “always march in lock-step”; “vanderbirds,” which look like pelicans with under-wing pouches in which they collect snacks; and more. Pip’s ability to communicate with all these creatures gives her and Tomas clues to the reasons for apparent vandalism in the town of Port Candor, where Pip, Tomas, Pip’s cousin Callie, and Tomas’ family are on vacation: the vandalism turns out to be connected to the well-meaning but misguided captivity of the slimekraken, who turns out to be not so much monstrous as she is lonely. Really, the mystery here is on the mild side and the upbeat ending a foregone conclusion. But the parade of just-unusual-enough animals and Pip’s special communicative abilities (in which, of course, the rather dim adults do not believe) combine to make this series entry attractively amusing.

     Barbara Kerley’s Following Baxter is fun and amusing, too, although this standalone book (aimed at the same age range as the Pip Bartlett novels: 8-12) is a little too thin and a touch too obvious to gain more than a (+++) rating. Baxter is a dog with whom 11-year-old Jordie Marie Wallace seems able to communicate: he seems to understand everything she says, although he does not reply in kind as the magical creatures do to Pip. Baxter lives with Professor Reese, who has just moved in next door to Jordie’s family and who is working on the usual important and secret experiments that preoccupy scientists in fantasies for this age range. Specifically, what Professor Reese is in the process of discovering and exploring is teleportation – instantaneous transmission of objects and people from one place to another. Jordie and her younger brother, TJ, spend a lot of time with Professor Reese, and Jordie, who narrates the book, soon discovers, “There was this secret layer of science that had always been there, when I made hot chocolate in Dad’s microwave or turned on the lights. The secret layer of science was everywhere. I’d just never noticed it before.” And now that Jordie does notice the ubiquity of science, she becomes involved when Professor Reese’s teleportation experiments, predictably, go awry. How does Baxter fit into all this? Baxter is declared “king of the bounce” for his ability to catch balls no matter the direction in which they bounce – even superbouncy ones that “superbounced superfast.” And this ability turns out to be crucial in getting the teleportation device working properly and then figuring out exactly where things are going on the other end when they do not go just where they are supposed to go. This becomes a significant issue when Professor Reese herself is teleported to – well, somewhere – and Jordie and TJ need to do some detective work to figure out where “somewhere” is. This gets them involved with a series of numbers that in turn relate to Baxter’s microchip while corresponding to latitude designations, and – well, Kerley complicates the mystery enough to keep things interesting, and even overdoes it a bit, especially by introducing a rather surly detective who is using silly and feckless adult reasoning to search for the professor when it is obvious that dog communication and microchip manipulation are called for. The use of the detective is not the only slightly off-kilter element here: there is also the relationship of Jordie’s parents. They “are separated, but we all still live together. Sort of. Dad’s part of the house is a studio apartment built right on top of the garage.” Umm, well, OK. Anyway, there is nothing genuinely scientific in Following Baxter, and Kerley knows it, explaining at the back of the book just how complicated genuine teleportation would be, if it could be done at all. Following Baxter is all in fun, and if Baxter turns out to be a livelier and more fully realized character than any of the humans, that is unlikely to trouble preteen readers very much, if at all.

(+++) REFUSING TO BE UNABLE

Bat and the Waiting Game. By Elana K. Arnold. Pictures by Charles Santoso. Walden Pond Press. $16.99.

Into the Nightfell Wood. By Kristin Bailey. Katherine Tegen/HarperCollins. $16.99.

     Although neither of these novels is labeled as a sequel, both are second entries in series – and both feature central characters with a disability of some type that is important to the story but that does not in any way limit their involvement in the events. Thus, one element of both books’ stories is their underlying notion that being disabled does not mean being unable to accomplish things – and have exciting adventures. Actually, the adventure in Bat and the Waiting Game, for ages 6-10, is a mundane suburban one, involving family, friends, school and pets. But it is somewhat out of the ordinary because the pet here is a baby skunk, known as a kit, that Bat is caring for after his mother, a veterinarian, brings it home. Bat’s parents are divorced, so there are the usual-for-this-age-group difficulties associated with the situation (that is to say, mild misunderstandings). But it is Bat himself – so named for the initials of his name, Bixby Alexander Tam – who is the most unusual element of the book, since he has autism spectrum disorder and his responses to stimuli are not the ones to be expected from most kids his age. Yet a major point of the book is that everyone accepts Bat just as he is, at every step of the way in the story: his parents; his sister, Janie, whose school performance is ruined when Thor, the skunk, sprays the auditorium after Bat unwisely brings the animal to school; his best friend, Israel; his teacher, Mr. Grayson; and everyone else who appears in Elana K. Arnold’s novel. This is thus a book of determined mainstreaming: there are no significant bumps in the road for Bat or anyone who interacts with him, and everybody is accepting, helpful, and more than willing to treat Bat exactly the way everyone else is treated. To say this is a naïve and wishful interpretation of the integration of autism into society is to state the obvious – but families with children at or near Bat’s position on the autism spectrum will welcome the normalization of the condition that the book offers and may even be able to use it as a teaching tool for families with non-autistic children. Charles Santoso’s pleasant, anime-inspired illustrations treat all the characters with equal sensitivity, just as Arnold’s writing does. There is little unusual in the plot and interactions in Bat and the Waiting Game, which is a followup story to A Boy Called Bat. But at some level, that is exactly the point Arnold wants to make: Bat and other children on the autism spectrum are exactly like everyone else here, except for some very small and easily handled behaviors that may seem slightly quirky. In the real world, these children are not exactly like everyone else and not as simply integrated into everyday activities as Bat is, but families with kids like Bat would certainly like them to be. So if Bat and the Waiting Game depicts an idealized world, it does so for good reason and out of good motives, and at least does not take things so far as to make the entire setting seem like an unattainable fantasy.

     The world of Into the Nightfell Wood, on the other hand, is an unattainable fantasy, by design. This is the sequel to The Silver Gate and offers the further adventures of that novel’s protagonists: Wynn and her older brother, Elric. Intended for readers ages 8-12, Into the Nightfell Wood features a protagonist with a rare genetic condition called Rubinstein-Taybi syndrome. This is a disease that causes short stature, moderate to major learning difficulties, various distinctive facial features, and broad thumbs and first toes – for which reason it is sometimes called broad thumb-hallux syndrome. A difficulty with Into the Nightfell Wood is that readers need to know about Wynn’s genetic inheritance from the start, even though it is not presented here: it was discussed by Kristin Bailey in an author’s note to The Silver Gate. Not knowing about Wynn’s condition makes Into the Nightfell Wood, which already follows the preteen fantasy-adventure formula rather slavishly, seem even more formulaic. For example, much of the book involves Wynn’s discovery that she is braver, stronger and has more abilities than she herself has ever believed. That common trope of the genre gains extra depth for readers who understand what genetic background Wynn possesses and is learning to overcome. Similarly, Elric’s love for and faith in his sister, another standard element of fare of this sort, means more in light of Wynn’s condition; readers unaware of it will find less to enjoy and admire in the siblings’ relationship. The story itself here is quite a standard one. In the first book, Wynn and Elric were on a quest for safety, which they found by passing through the Silver Gate and being adopted by the Fairy Queen, who declared them prince and princess of the realm. The queen has her own problems, however, in Into the Nightfell Wood. She shields the land from the darkness that dwells in the Nightfell Wood, which is under the control of the evil Grendel. But her power is being undermined by her grief over the long-ago kidnapping of her own child, and she is overprotective of the new prince and princess. So soon enough, inevitably, Wynn is tricked into going into the Nightfell Wood, and Elric has to find and save her, and there ensue alternating chapters of the siblings’ adventures as they endure treachery, danger and violence while discovering kindness, bravery and love. There are the usual battles, imprisonments and escapes, and there is the usual pass at meaningfulness as Wynn and Elric learn about the true nature of evil. But Into the Nightfell Wood is mainly interesting for its focus on the siblings and their relationship – and that element is additionally meaningful only if readers know about Rubinstein-Taybi syndrome and how it has affected Wynn. Pre-reading of The Silver Gate is really a must for enjoyment of this successor novel.

(+++) FORMS OF THE MODERN

Victoria Bond: Soul of a Nation—Concerto Portraits of Presidential Character. Frank Almond, violin; John Bruce Yeh, clarinet; Mark Ridenour, trumpet; Gabriela Vargas, flute; Roosevelt University Chamber Orchestra conducted by Emanuele Andrizzi; Chicago College of Performing Arts Wind Ensemble conducted by Stephen Squires. Albany Records. $16.99.

New Standards: Music for Bassoon and Piano. Ann Shoemaker, bassoon; Kae Hosoda-Ayer, piano. MSR Classics. $12.95.

New Works for Viols, Voice, and Electronics. Kristin Norderval, soprano; Dashon Burton, bass-baritone; Valeria Vasilevski, narrator; Parthenia (Beverly Au and Lisa Terry, bass viols; Lawrence Lipnik, tenor viol; Rosamund Morley, treble viol). MSR Classics. $12.95.

     Many contemporary composers, and contemporary performers who focus on works of today and the recent past, seem always to be searching for new ways to use music, ways to make connections sometimes with listeners, sometimes with fellow performers, and sometimes with society at large so as to make social or political points. And at least some composers working today draw directly on music of the past as a model, or a lens through which to see what they want listeners to observe. The four presidential-focused concertos by Victoria Bond (born 1945) on a new Albany Records CD quite clearly have Copland’s Lincoln Portrait as a model – Bond herself says so – but they also, and rather more interestingly, adapt Charles Ives’ approach of including familiar, even homespun music within the newly composed material. In Bond’s works, for example, this results in providing aural touchstones for a musical study of Theodore Roosevelt by including, among other tunes, “Take Me Out to the Ballgame.” These four concertos are in fact studies rather than tributes, along the lines of Ives’ portraits of transcendentalists: all four Bond pieces include words by Myles Lee that take a rather too-modern perspective on the presidents and tend to judge them by inappropriately contemporary standards. Like Lincoln’s own words in Copland’s work about Lincoln, Lee’s writings about these four presidents are intended as scene-setters, but they also come across interpretatively in ways that are rather grating and add little, if anything, to Bond’s music. The music itself is intelligently and often cleverly constructed. The sequence on the CD is a personal rather than chronological one. The violin-and-strings concerto, Soul of a Nation, is in some ways the most interesting piece: it focuses on Thomas Jefferson, the nation’s only polymath president, and incorporates music by Corelli that Jefferson kept in his library at Monticello. Henry Fogel is the narrator here, with violinist Frank Almond and the Roosevelt University Chamber Orchestra conducted by Emanuele Andrizzi. The music of this piece is heartfelt and often soulful, exploring greater depths than Bond probes in the other concertos. The Jefferson work is followed by The Indispensable Man, the title referring not to Lincoln but to Franklin D. Roosevelt, the one president here whom Lee appears to admire unreservedly. David Holloway narrates and John Bruce Yeh is the clarinetist in a work whose jazzy riffs and bouncy percussion meld, sometimes a touch uneasily, with Big Band sounds. The ensemble parts here and in the remaining concertos are very well played by the Chicago College of Performing Arts Wind Ensemble conducted by Stephen Squires. The third concerto, The Crowded Hours, focuses on Theodore Roosevelt and features Ray Frewen as narrator and Mark Ridenour on trumpet. Percussion plays a significant role in this rather martial work, interspersed with popular tunes of Roosevelt’s time. Last on the CD is Pater Patriae, narrated by Adrian Dunn, featuring Gabriela Vargas on flute, and focusing on George Washington. Here the music, which includes 18^th-century fife-and-drum tunes, is jauntier and generally more unsophisticated in sound than that of the other concertos, presumably to make Washington come across as a man of strength and moral clarity but also making him seem rather superficial. Of course, every generation has different heroic figures, and every musical generation delineates its subjects differently: Ives was as much a man of his time, in this sense, as Bond is a woman of hers. If there is something rather too studied in some of Bond’s music (and much of Lee’s verbiage), it does not detract from the very fine construction of all these works and the genuinely interesting material that appears in all of them, from time to time if not from start to finish.

     Bond reaches out to a broad American audience with her presidential concertos. Ann Shoemaker seems more interested in reaching out to other performers – bassoonists who, like Shoemaker herself, would like to find some additional works to play. The result is an MSR Classics release that is a musical hodgepodge, containing material written as long ago as 1899 and as recently as 2007, most of it falling into the salon-music category through pleasant construction, some mildly memorable tunes, and very little that is aurally challenging. Performance challenges, however, abound, and Shoemaker surmounts all of them to excellent effect: this is really a CD for bassoonists and for listeners interested in seeing just how much the instrument (whose range is considerably wider than most people realize) can do both expressively and virtuosically. The oldest work here, 3 Pièces pour basson et piano by Charles Koechlin (1867-1950), is one of the most engaging, giving the bassoon plenty of chances to sing warmly and sweetly, setting a quiet and contemplative mood to fine effect. The Koechlin work contrasts very pleasantly with the three more-outgoing ones that follow it on the disc and focus on the bassoon’s more-playful side. These are Etude No. 5: Variations on “Streets of Laredo” for solo bassoon (1982) by John Steinmetz (born 1951); Brightening for bassoon and piano (2007) by Marcus Karl Maroney (born 1976); and Scherzo in G minor for bassoon and piano (1948) by Oleg Miroshnikov (born 1925). In the Maroney and Miroshnikov works, and the others here that use piano, Kae Hosoda-Ayer does a fine job of backing Shoemaker up while allowing her to stay firmly in the limelight; the recording adds to this effect by placing the bassoon prominently front-and-center. Other works here have a distinctly French flavor (whether or not written by French composers) and a fair amount of élan: Neuf Pièces Breves pour basson et piano (1965) by Pierre Max Dubois (1930-1995); Variations Concertantes pour basson et piano (1970) by Ida Gotkovsky (born 1933); and Suite pour basson et piano (1957) by Alexandre Tansman (1897-1986). Dubois’ work most thoroughly explores the bassoon’s many moods, from an opening Pomposo to a Pastorale to an Adagio that contrasts nicely with the succeeding Giocoso. Also nicely contrasted on the CD are the two parts of Sicilienne et Allegro Giocoso pour basson et piano (1930) by Gabriel Grovlez (1879-1944), followed on the disc by the more monochromatic Black Anemones by Joseph Schwantner (born 1943) – a work written for voice and piano in 1980, transcribed for flute and piano in 1991, and here showing the bassoon’s ability to replicate both vocal elements and the characteristics of a higher woodwind. The fact that none of the composers heard here is particularly well-known (only Koechlin and perhaps Tansman will be familiar names to most listeners) shows how far-ranging Shoemaker had to be in her search for new and/or neglected bassoon repertoire. It would be nice to report that she found some genuine gems, but in fact the works here are more of the semi-precious variety: bassoonists may well want to incorporate some of them into recitals, but the CD is unlikely to repay everyday listeners through multiple hearings – the material, while generally quite pleasant, offers little to bring an audience back repeatedly except for the high quality of Shoemaker’s playing.

     The sheer sound of another MSR Classics release is also its main attraction. This is a CD of world première recordings of contemporary works for Renaissance viol consort – quite a concept! – plus an electronically enhanced version of the 850-plus-year-old chant Alleluia, O Virga Mediatrix by Hildegard von Bingen. This piece opens the CD and sets up its female orientation: all the works are by women composers, a fact far less relevant than the pieces’ thematic focus on storytelling. What the viol ensemble Parthenia does to and with the gorgeous von Bingen chant will be very much a matter of taste; but then, so will all the works here, even though the chance to hear a Renaissance viol consort in pretty much any repertoire is a highly welcome one. Nevertheless, listeners should know that none of the composers here pays any particular attention, much less tribute, to historical works for viol consort: this is decidedly modern music that uses the viols (and, yes, electronics) in strictly contemporary ways. Nevertheless, sensitivity to the intimate sound of viols is evident in some of the music. In particular, From a Fairy Tale (2013) by Frances White, from a story by James Pritchett, explores and exploits the otherworldly aspects of the viols’ sound to fine and suitable effect. Thorns for viol quartet and bass-baritone (2013), by Tawnie Olson, is also unaffected and direct, with a finely honed performance by Dashon Burton adding to the effect of a piece that does not overstay its welcome. The other two works on the CD are somewhat thornier than Thorns, and they are the longest pieces on the disc. White’s A Flower on the Farther Side (2010), for viol quartet and electronic sound, seems rather self-conscious in its integration (or dis-integration) of the centuries-old instruments with the usual parade of electronics. And the longest piece here, the four-movement Nothing Proved Can Be (2008) by Kristin Norderval, for viol quartet, soprano, and interactive audio processing, is the most curious – intellectually fascinating but emotionally rather vapid. The issue here has to do with content as well as sound: the words are those of Queen Elizabeth I, the topic no less than her rise to and retention of power and the sacrifices and ruthlessness required of her. The use of instruments of Elizabeth’s era to set her own words gives the work a kind of time-capsule quality and a sense of solidity, but the actual music and the audio processing used to enhance (or at least alter) it create a disconnect between what is being said and explored, on the one hand, and the way things are being said and explored, on the other. The result is a work of undeniable complexity whose intricacy of thought and design is clear but whose impact is less visceral that Norderval surely intends it to be. The members of Parthenia play this and all the other pieces here – all written and premièred by the ensemble – with commitment and, when called for, considerable beauty. The verbal participants – Burton, Valeria Vasilevski and composer Norderval as a soprano – evince a strong sense of commitment to the material and a high level of comfort with these works’ style. The CD is a fascinating foray into nowadays little-heard sonorities that are reinterpreted in a strictly up-to-date context – a disc for a rarefied audience that will find the material sometimes charming, sometimes thought-provoking, and sometimes, however improbably, both at once.

(++++) MAGICAL THINKING

The Cardboard Kingdom. By Chad Sell. Knopf. $20.99.

My Magic Breath: Finding Calm Through Mindful Breathing. By Nick Ortner and Alison Taylor. Pictures by Michelle Polizzi. Harper. $17.99.

     An exceptionally inventive and intelligent graphic novel that integrates significant themes of friendship and identity into its flow without ever becoming overbearing or preachy, The Cardboard Kingdom nearly represents a new form of communication. Graphic novels themselves blend comic-book elements with traditional narrative, but Chad Sell – with the additional involvement of 10 other artists, that being part of what makes the book special – expands the graphic-novel approach itself and uses it to tackle some real-life conundrums in a highly sensitive yet age-appropriate way. The book’s very first chapter, “The Sorceress,” created by Sell and Jay Fuller, sets an offbeat and highly intriguing tone: the entire chapter is wordless, and it takes a moment of study of the first two full-page drawings even to figure out what is going on. The left-hand page is a cartoonish rendition of a sorceress in the mode of Disney’s Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty. The right-hand page shows the same character in a much more “cartoon-realistic” style, the sort that actually could be included as a still in an animated film. Turn the page, and the story’s third page shows the sorceress and a minion doing their evil – until they are interrupted by seeing a girl drawn to look like a real-world human being. And that forms the visual transition to the story’s fourth page, where it turns out that both sorceress and minion are kids playing in a house’s back yard, their “victim” a doll. This is how the story – and, eventually, the entire book – proceeds, by intermingling and interweaving the fantasies of middle-school children with the everyday circumstances in which they bring those fantasies to life. The Cardboard Kingdom gets its name from the abundant use of cardboard boxes to make costumes and props for the ongoing role-playing. And the book gets its unique style from the fact that the controlling hand of Sell is evident throughout, keeping character portrayals and scenes consistent from chapter to chapter, while other cartoonists – David DeMeo, Katie Schenkel, Kris Moore, Molly Muldoon, Vid Alliger, Manuel Betancourt, Michael Cole, Cloud Jacobs, and Barbara Perez Marquez, in addition to Fuller – contribute specific kids and specific characters to the neighborhood and fantasy-kingdom mix.

     All this is clever and enchanting enough, but there is considerably more here. The kids are multiethnic and multicultural, and that has become a tired trope of books for preteens (and other age ranges as well). But here the kids’ families and characteristics are not merely sops to political correctness. These children have real-world issues. One girl is taunted as “Loud-Mouth Sophie” by the neighborhood bully, then criticized by her own grandmother for sounding like “a hellion” or “a banshee.” So she backs down from her plan for an exuberant costume and tries to be demure, but feels worse and worse – until her mother eventually realizes what is happening and helps Sophie regain her enthusiasm. The bully has his own story, one of not fitting in and feeling he is too old for dress-up games even though he really wants to participate – and here too there is eventually a satisfactory resolution, brought about largely by the kids themselves. Then there is the very intelligent boy who insists the fantasy characters are impossible because “physics won’t allow” what they do – who eventually finds his own role, as “Professor Everything.” And the boy whose parents are in the middle of breaking up, who becomes “The Gargoyle” to “stand guard over this house” when his enraged father turns up one night – and whose determination to “defend the whole block” shows in several pages of wordless, unusually shaped panels that clearly communicate his attentiveness and nervousness. And Amanda, the Hispanic girl who proclaims herself “The Mad Scientist” – complete with mustache – and whose straitlaced father means well in telling her that “changing your friends around…isn’t helping them,” but who eventually softens when he realizes that her mustache duplicates his own. The kids here are fully formed individuals, and even their parents have more realism than parents usually do in any books (traditional or graphic-novel-style) for this age group. Young readers who want to find characters who “look like me” should have no difficulty doing so here – but that superficial “look like me” approach is really an adult construct of limited value, because what kids care about is characters with whose experiences and feelings they can identify, even if the physical resemblance is not exact. So the multicultural neighborhood where The Cardboard Kingdom takes place is all well and good, and handled far better than such elements usually are. But what really matters is that all children in this age group, of any race or ethnicity, should be able to find elements to which they can relate in this summertime story – which ends in exactly the right, consistent way, in a bang-up fantasy finale that eventually leads to a scene in which all the creators of the “kingdom” are heading into the first day of a new school year, their shadows showing the shapes of some of the marvels that they, thanks to Sell and his collaborators, have made so memorable.

     The way that even the best of intentions can go awry through heavy-handed implementation is clear from the equally well-meaning but altogether less persuasive My Magic Breath, a book for younger kids – ages 4-8 – that is intended to teach the basic benefits of mindfulness without actually using any such big word. Nick Ortner and Alison Taylor explain, in suitably simple language, the importance of focusing on breathing when trying to calm down and refocus. And Michelle Polizzi’s illustrations are nicely suited to the text, showing all sorts of multicolored swirls and shapes curling out of a little girl’s mouth as she breathes in a way that “helps when you have too many thoughts running through your head,” and showing somewhat similar but darker-colored shapes to go with a comment about “when you are worried, or nervous, or sad.” The book’s approach is participatory: Ortner and Taylor address their readers, tell them to think of something that “happened today that made you smile,” then instruct them to “blow out all those happy thoughts onto the page,” and so on. But what if nothing happened to make a child smile during the day, and what if the page saying “now, that looks like happiness” does not reflect how the child reading the book feels at that exact moment? Well, then, too bad – there will be a disconnect between the reader and the book’s words and pictures. That is the weakness of this (+++) book: it expects young children to accept what it says about their feelings and their thoughts at any given moment, then instructs them how to handle themselves at a time when they may simply not be in sync with what the book has to say. To be sure, this matter can be mitigated by having an adult read the book to and with a child, choosing a reading time when the grown-up believes the child will be receptive to the book’s lesson. An adult who chooses the right time will be helping the child use breathing to cope with everyday stress. But even then, the specificity of the book may interfere with the clarity of its message: after several pages of positive breathing, Ortner and Taylor write, “I bet you have a big smile on your face.” But what if the child does not have that smile? He or she is likely to think, “What am I doing wrong?” And that is the opposite of the way the authors want kids to feel when trying the techniques they recommend. The suggestions themselves are quite good, including the one to keep a negative thought “stuck in your mind” and then “blow out your breath” and “use it to push out your sad thought.” Again, Polizzi here provides guiding illustrations that go from dark to multicolored. But again, what if a child does not find that this works? “What am I doing wrong?” This is not a small issue: even adults learning meditation and controlled breathing sometimes find that the requirements associated with the instructions increase their stress. Indeed, mindfulness meditation is not for everyone, although when it does help, it can be a good coping strategy. The issue where My Magic Breath is concerned is that the authors unequivocally state, as they take young readers through breathing exercises, “Whew! You did it! Good-by, sad thoughts!” But, since this will not work all the time for all children, the book creates the possibility – by its insistence on being didactic and on pretending to know exactly how its readers feel and respond – of making kids who already feel bad feel even worse. Parents need to use this book carefully: at the right time, with the right child, it can certainly be helpful, but its direct and unsubtle approach carries with it the risk of having an effect that is the opposite of the one its creators intend.

(++++) DOING IT GRAPHICALLY

Tom’s Midnight Garden: A Graphic Adaptation of the Philippa Pearce Classic. By EDITH. Greenwillow/HarperCollins. $22.99.

Mr. Wolf’s Class. By Aron Nels Steinke. Graphix/Scholastic. $9.99.

     The very best graphic novel adaptations use the form itself as an element in telling their stories. They do not simply show the exact scenes described in their sources – they go beyond the words to use illustrations to highlight the emotions of characters and to make descriptive passages come alive for readers in ways beyond those called up by the original material. There are very few graphic novels with this kind of power – P. Craig Russell’s two-volume adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book (2014) is perhaps the finest recent example. The adaptation of Tom’s Midnight Garden by EDITH (who uses only one name) is very nearly on the same level. Philippa Pearce’s book is less-known in North America than in England, but it is one of those rare novels that treat children like fully formed human beings who are capable of encountering strange, even unnerving aspects of life and learning from them – along the lines of, say, Norton Juster’s The Phantom Tollbooth. A Carnegie Medal winner after its 1958 publication, the book is the story of a boy named Tom Long, who is sent to live temporarily with his pleasant aunt and stern, straitlaced uncle while his brother, Peter, is quarantined with measles. Tom himself is kept in his aunt’s and uncle’s home because of the possibility that he might have the same disease and be infectious – the measles vaccine was not available until the 1960s. Resentful of the situation and his isolation, Tom broods – until one night he hears the old grandfather clock downstairs strike 13. When he goes down to check on the clock and opens the back door, Tom finds himself in a huge, expansive garden rather than the drab, citified back yard of his aunt’s and uncle’s home. This could easily become a kind of Narnia tale at this point, but Pearce takes the story in a very different direction. Night after night, Tom visits the garden, soon making the acquaintance of a girl named Hatty – apparently the only person who can see him. The two become fast friends, sharing their worries, concerns and troubles and having a variety of small adventures. But there are hints that something deeper is going on, as when Tom sees a tree fall in a storm and the next night sees it standing straight, unharmed. The story soon becomes one about ghosts and time – is Hatty a ghost in Tom’s time period, which is clearly later than hers, or is Tom a ghost in Hatty’s, or is something even stranger happening? Eventually Tom discovers that Hatty is growing up even though he remains the same – and at the book’s climax, Tom discovers who Hatty really is (not just “was”), and the two of them try to untangle the strange threads that have bound them together. Tom’s Midnight Garden is a very atmospheric book, and what EDITH does so well with it is to emphasize its settings and the way they reflect the events. The panels are all rectangular – there is no attempt here to use unusual panel shapes for their own sake or for effect, as in many graphic novels. And many of the best panels are wordless: Tom’s first sight of the garden, the look of his bare feet in the grass, the contrast between the outdoors and the prison-like conditions of the dull home of Tom’s aunt and uncle (where Tom’s room actually has bars on the window, left over from its onetime use as a nursery), the first time Tom realizes that Hatty can see him (he sticks his tongue out and then so does she), and so forth. Carefully conceived poses help EDITH bring the emotional impact of the book to the fore, as when orphan Hatty’s dreadful aunt calls her “liar” (a medium-close picture of the aunt grabbing Hatty’s arm), “criminal” (Tom’s shocked, wide-eyed reaction to what is happening), and “monster” (the aunt dragging Hatty away) – followed by a full page of wordless reaction panels. The emotional heft of the story comes through with exceptional clarity in this highly sensitive graphic adaptation, and even though much is, of necessity, left out, everything that matters the most is included and given heightened impact. Young readers who do not know Tom’s Magic Garden may be inspired by this graphic novel to read the book itself. But even if they are not, the adaptation itself so beautifully captures the mood of the book and the thoughtful questions it poses that children who know the novel only as EDITH interprets it will retain much of the effect of wonder that Pearce’s original produces.

     At the opposite extreme from the involvement, delight and thoughtfulness of the Tom’s Midnight Garden adaptation is the first book in a new series that is as straightforward and humdrum as possible. Aron Nels Steinke’s Mr. Wolf’s Class is about a fourth-grade class doing entirely ordinary things – everyday, frequently boring things. The characters are all cartoon animals, drawn in a flat style with little attention paid to anatomical correctness (Mr. Wolf’s bent elbows look especially unrealistic, even by cartoon standards: whatever arm has the elbow bent is significantly longer than the other). It is hard to see what sort of message this book tries to convey, because all it does is take readers through a completely typical day at a completely typical school in which completely typical things happen to completely typical people – well, animals, but none of them has any animal characteristics whatsoever. Samples of dialogue: “What is your name?” “I need to go to the bathroom.” “I’m so sleepy.” “Line up for lunch.” “Five more minutes of recess.” “Can I play?” “Don’t forget your homework.” More than 150 pages of this becomes very, very wearing and very, very tiresome. The purpose of this graphic novel is very hard to discern. Fourth-graders need not read it – they are living it. Third-graders probably should not read it – it gives them little to look forward to in fourth grade. Fifth-graders will not want to read it – it will be old news to them. The largely expressionless faces and flat drawing style make Mr. Wolf’s Class seem like a book that would appeal to the earliest readers, perhaps kindergartners or first-graders, but it is hard to know whether that is the intended audience. Graphic novels need not be over-the-top – or based on classic novels – to be interesting and to communicate effectively. But they have to have something to communicate. Mr. Wolf’s Class simply puts across the idea that in fourth grade, kids do math, read, go to lunch, have recess, and go home. All that is true, but it is hard to see the point of putting such extremely basic information in graphic-novel form. Mr. Wolf’s Class is a (++) book that does little to whet the appetite for the planned followup, Mystery Club – although hopefully the title of the next book indicates that a bit more excitement lies ahead.

(+++) GETTING FANTASIES GOING

Maggie & Abby’s Neverending Pillow Fort. By Will Taylor. Harper. $16.99.

Elementals No. 1: Ice Wolves. By Amie Kaufman. Harper. $16.99.

     As scene-setters for new fantasy series, these books do a good, if formulaic, job of setting up their story lines and the worlds in which the events take place. Preteen readers will quickly be able to decide whether either book introduces characters and events worth following into the future, whether both do, or whether to look elsewhere. Maggie & Abby’s Neverending Pillow Fort has an intriguing premise and an interesting take on middle-grade friendships, in which one best friend seems to be growing up more quickly than the other until an unanticipated adventure brings them even closer together. Maggie has been missing Abby for six weeks of the summer, while Abby has been at Camp Cantaloupe – but the two friends do not quite connect when Abby comes home, because Abby now has a bigger circle of friends and is interested in more aspects of the real world than Maggie is. Despite the somewhat jarring rejoining, the two friends put up a couple of pillow forts – Maggie with enthusiasm, Abby initially more reluctantly – and then discover that they can magically travel directly from one to the other. As if that is not enough, they find that the pillow forts can be portals to places a great distance away, specifically to Alaska, where Maggie’s uncle is studying whales in a remote location. Soon the girls are visiting him regularly. But they are also running afoul of an organization they had no way to know about: NAFAFA, the suitable acronym of the oddly named North American Founding and Allied Forts Alliance. It turns out that there is a network of pillow forts all around the continent, but there are regulations and requirements for building and using them, and Maggie and Abby have been breaking all the rules. NAFAFA demands that the girls toe the line or their forts will be destroyed. And then it is Maggie who seems the more-mature of the two, refusing to accept NAFAFA’s demands at face value while Abby wants simply to go along with them. Then, to bring in the real world in ways neither girl ever expected, they find out on one visit to Alaska that Uncle Joe has been seriously injured. Now they have to reveal the secrets of their fort to others in order to save him – all the while trying to fend off NAFAFA, especially one megalomaniacal character. Will Taylor’s blend of fantasy and real-world events is a bit creaky here, and his efforts to be politically correct by having Abby’s father dating another man seem forced and unnecessary. So does the use of silver sunglasses by NAFAFA members. But the relationship between Maggie and Abby is well developed, and the girls themselves have sufficiently contrasting personalities to make them appealing to a variety of readers. The book’s ending is disappointing in being an overt cliffhanger: readers will have to wait for the next book to find out what will happen, and may be frustrated as a result. On balance, though, the strengths of Maggie & Abby’s Neverending Pillow Fort outweigh its weaknesses.

     Alaska is not the setting for Ice Wolves, the first book in a series called Elementals, but it certainly could be if the sequence were set on Earth rather than in the land called Vallen where it actually takes place. The story here is even more formulaic than is usual in middle-grade novels, and that is saying something. There is a land where there is magic. There are opposing forces known as Ice Wolves and Scorch Dragons – fire and ice, see? There are 12-year-old twins, a boy and a girl, who are very close. There is a ceremony at which it turns out that one twin can shapeshift to an Ice Wolf, the other to a Scorch Dragon. So the twins – are they even really related? – are supposed to be lifelong enemies. But they will not have it that way. And in this first book, Rayna, who has dragon blood, flees the Wolf Guard and is captured by the dragons – while Anders, who has wolf blood, must train at the Guard’s Ulfar Academy in order to learn about wolves and dragons and find a way to save his twin sister. Like Maggie & Abby’s Neverending Pillow Fort, this first Elementals book cares about political correctness – actually to an even greater degree, since the village of Holbard, where the story takes place, is known worldwide for being diverse, multicultural, and all that good stuff. Also like Maggie & Abby’s Neverending Pillow Fort, the first Elementals book ends with a cliffhanger that will have readers either eagerly awaiting the next installment or being frustrated at being told, after more than 330 pages, “This could be a beginning.” Perhaps, but the ending is rather predictable and, in truth, something of an anticlimax rather than a climax. In fact, the whole story is on the dull side, and Amie Kaufman cheats readers in several ways – for instance, the central notion of how close Anders and Rayna are must be accepted because Kaufman says so, not because readers ever see anything happening to show their bond. In truth, Kaufman seems more enamored of the diversity elements than of the story: she uses the whole “multicultural” thing to explain her created world and its mythology, in passages that are more interesting than, for example, the long sections about Anders’ schooling. Kaufman has written a number of books for teenagers, so-called Young Adult fiction, but this is her first book for younger readers. Unfortunately, it feels as if she oversimplified quite a few things in her effort to reach the target 8-12 age range.