Operation Bunny

Operation Bunny, book one in the Wings & Co. series written by Sally Gardner and illustrated by David Roberts is an amusing English take on a kid escaping a mean adoptive mother with the help of magical friends.  (The opening description of a suburban couple with a villa in Spain and garden topiary is a…

Dealing With Dragons

Dealing with Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede and performed by the Words Take Wing Repertory Company of Syracuse, New York was a very entertaining twist on the standard tale of knights, princesses, and dragons. In a fashion similar to Hamster Princess : Harriet the Invincible (by Ursula Vernon), Wrede’s princess has little patience for what’s…

Hamster Princess : Harriet the Invincible

Hamster Princess : Harriet the Invincible Volume 1 by Ursula Vernon is a great new series – even better in some respects than Vernon’s older Danny Dragonbreath series. Harriet has the brash bluntness of Danny but she’s a bit brighter and more independent – her sidekick is her trusty quail steed Mumfrey who, though brave…

Akame ga Kill! Volume 1

Akame ga Kill! Volume 1 by Takahiro and art by Tetsuya Tashiro is very soft core porn masquerading as a story of ninjas seeking justice, peace, and fame and fortune. In the end notes Takahiro’s comments that his original pitch was “about an all-female band of assassins, and the protagonist is a boy who is…

The Boggart

The Boggart by Susan Cooper was an okay book: the kids have parents – though they are somewhat distracted and self-absorbed – and behave in a reasonably normal kid fashion but I just had a really hard time with the [small spoiler alert] with the deaths of the old Scotsman and his faithful hound at…