Review by New York Times Review
IN FOLKLORE, the figure of the changeling often involves an enchanted piece of wood placed in a crib by fairies that a parent finds instead of her baby. The wood might become ill and die, or the fairies might skip the wood altogether and leave a fairy-baby instead, carting the little human off for other purposes. Either way, there's a particular kind of terror inherent in the situation: to look in a crib expecting to see one's cooing infant and instead find something inert and unknown. Maurice Sendak's picture book "Outside Over There" captures the horror with a rich gorgeousness, where the replacement baby is made of ice, and glows milky and terrifying and odd on the page. Kenneth Oppel's new middle-grade novel, "The Nest," also explores this alarming terrain, but he has artfully flipped the role of the changeling. What if one's child, one's flawed and ill child, a child even headed for surgery, was set to be replaced through the agency of some wasp-like fairies, whose baby-creation will be whole and happy and gleaming and well? What if the parents never, ever know that the new baby slipped into the crib is not their own, but someone else does? It is a predicament Huxley would have appreciated. With an adroit hand, Oppel writes from the point of view of Steve, the baby's older brother, the only character who sees what is happening and may be able to do something about it. Steve is an anxious kid. He sleeps with his covers bunched up on his face because he wants to be cocooned, he washes his hands too often and he reads long gratitude lists obsessively every night before sleep. Early in the book, he begins dreaming of angel-like wasps, one in particular, a queen, who speaks to him with "huge dark eyes, and a kind of mane made of light." Her words soothe and unsettle. She, like Steve, is concerned about the welfare of the new baby, and she has some ideas about what to do. "We come," she reassures him, "when people are scared or in trouble." One of the strengths of the pacing is that for the first half of the book, the allies and villains are not completely distinguishable. The wasp queen calms Steve in a genuine way. Somebody else, whom the family calls Mr. Nobody, keeps calling the house and not saying anything. Despite my hunches, I found myself deliciously unsure whom to side with for a number of pages. In large part, this is due to the allure of Oppel's imagery, which is striking and scary at once: A dissected wasp with nothing inside it. A knife grinder who drives slowly around the streets but has no customers. A toy phone answered with glee by Steve's little sister. Occasional illustrations by the wonderful Jon Klassen, dark and secretive, only add to the mood. As the story progresses, Steve's dreams intensify, clues emerge and fear mounts. Steve is increasingly worried, unsure how to track what is in his mind and what needs fixing in the world, and Oppel attends to his narrator's fears and internal conversations with honesty and care. "I felt," Steve says, "like my head was being crammed full of crumpled bits of paper, and I was trying to unfold them all to read the answers." In fact, Oppel is so lightfooted in these parts, so careful to let the imagery do the bulk of the work, vivid and unanalyzed, that when, toward the end, Steve and the queen have a final talk that outlines the story's themes clearly, the broader strokes of the writing don't carry the same weight. Perhaps there is an expectation that middle-grade readers need more spelling-out, but I don't think it was needed. And although I found the subsequent big action sequence gripping, and turned the pages rapidly, I still missed the delicacy I had felt so keenly in the earlier pages, when Oppel takes his time drawing the world through the eyes of a preadolescent boy who is so scared, and so attuned. That said, "The Nest" leaves a lasting mark on the memory, and by the end, Oppel tenderly champions the world of the broken and anxious, the sick and the flawed. Readers will find much to savor here, both scary and subtle. AIIMEE BENDER is the author of five books of fiction, most recently "The Color Master."
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 11, 2015]
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Steven's parents just had a baby, Theo, but there's something wrong with him, and a pall of worry and sadness falls over his family. Meanwhile, a papery wasp's nest appears under the eaves of the house, just outside Theo's room, and Steven starts to dream of an angelic wasp who promises to fix whatever's wrong with the baby. At first, Steven is comforted by the wasp's soft assurances. But the wasp's plans grow more and more sinister, until they turn shockingly ugly: before you know it, you'll forget all about that crappy little broken baby. In Steven's restrained present-tense, first-person narrative, the wasp's dreadful plan slowly creeps into view, while Steven becomes increasingly determined to protect Theo, even though it would be easier for everyone if he weren't sick or broken. The brilliance of Oppel's storytelling lies in his ability to seamlessly integrate the wasp's cruel beliefs about worthiness into Steven's own fears about himself. Steven, who has a therapist to deal with his anxiety, believes he, too, is broken, and it isn't until he understands the grotesque lengths to which the wasps plan to go that he accepts Theo and himself for all his imperfections. Klassen's eerie, atmospheric illustrations, all shadowy corners and half-concealed shapes, contribute to the spooky mood. With subtle, spine-chilling horror at its heart, this tale of triumph over monsters both outside and in is outstanding. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Printz-winning, New York Times best-selling Oppel and Caldecott-winning Klassen are a match made in kid-lit heaven. Expect ample buzz.--Hunter, Sarah Copyright 2015 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Oppel (The Boundless) enters Gaimanesque territory with his portrayal of Steve, an older brother struggling with anxiety and his family's distress after his newborn brother, Theodore, is diagnosed with a rare congenital disorder. After a curious gray and white wasp from the hive above their house stings Steve, he develops the ability to speak to the hive's queen, who promises to replace the ailing baby with a new one. Agreeing to the queen's offer, Steve confronts a dangerous traveling knife sharpener, his parents' concerns over his mental health, and strange phone calls from Mr. Nobody, a family legend turned real, it seems. As Theodore's health deteriorates, Steve must decide what is best for his brother and what he will do to save him. Oppel infuses the natural world of the hive with chilling scenes of the queen's heartlessness ("Before you know it, you'll forget all about that crappy little broken baby") while Klassen's graphite drawings hauntingly depict the family's stress (an early image, all angles and shadows, shows Steve's parents standing solemnly over the baby's crib), as well as increasing tension between Theodore's complications and the wasps' growing power. In exploring the boundaries of science, self-determination, and belief, Oppel uses a dark and disturbing lens to produce an unnerving psychological thriller. Ages 8-12. Agent: Steven Malk, Writers House. (Oct.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-8-Steve has a lot to worry about-the dark, the new baby that is struggling to survive, his parents, his sister, and the wasps that seem to be everywhere. His dreams are troubled, and he always sleeps buried in his blanket with just a breathing hole because it feels safer. But then, the "angels" appear in his dreams promising to make the baby better-to make the baby perfect-and all Steve has to do is say yes. However, Steve has no idea at what price the promised miracle comes. Soon, his peaceful dreams of kind angels begin to darken, and reality presents itself in terrifying twisted turns. Narrator Gibson Frazier's pacing is so smooth that readers will forget themselves as they are caught up in this increasingly horrifying tale. Frazier's vocal changes for each character are subtle but convincing and well in keeping with the haunting events of the story. VERDICT Listeners who are fond of horror and suspense will find a chilling tale awaits them in this well-done presentation. ["This affecting middle grade psychological thriller is recommended as a first purchase for libraries": SLJ 8/15 starred review of the S. & S. book.]-Deanna Romriell, Salt Lake City Public Library © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
Steves baby brother came home from the hospital sick (there was something wrong with his heart and his eyes and his brain) and needing lots of care, so his parents dont pay much attention when Steve becomes afraid of the wasps in the backyard. He finds comfort in a recurring dream in which a compassionate voice offers to make everything better. All Steve must do is say yes to the offer, and his dream confidante will turn her promise of a healthy baby into reality. But as he learns more about the wasps that have built their nest outside baby Theos room, this easy fix starts to look like too sinister a bargain. Oppels (Airborn, rev. 7/04, and sequels; The Boundless, rev. 5/14) newest novel is a tight and focused story about the dangers of wishing things back to normal at any cost. The language is straightforward, rarely derailed by extraneous details, but the emotional resonance is deep, and Steves precarious interactions with the honey-voiced queen make ones skin crawl. Klassens full-page black-and-white drawingssimple, but with maximum impact, in shades of light, dark, and darkerastutely capture the magnitude of a childs imagination when he can rely only upon himself. sarah berman (c) Copyright 2015. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Steven must fight for his own life as well as for his baby brother's when he's offered a chance to exchange human life for something better. Steve has figured out strategies to cope with many of his anxieties and OCD behaviors, but this summer the pressure is on. Readers see through Steve's eyes his parents' fears for the new baby, whose congenital health issues are complicated and unusual. Readers may find parallels with Skellig in the sibling anxiety and the odd encounter with a winged creaturebut here the stranger is part of something sinister indeed. "We've come to help," assures the winged, slightly ethereal being who offers a solution to Steven in a dream. "We come when people are scared or in trouble. We come when there's grief." Oppel deftly conveys the fear and dislocation that can overwhelm a family: there's the baby born with problems, the ways that affects the family, and Steve's own struggles to feel and be normal. Everything feels a bit skewed, conveying the experience of being in transition from the familiar to the threateningly unfamiliar. Klassen's several illustrations in graphite, with their linear formality and stillness and only mere glimpses of people, nicely express this sense of worry and tension. Steve's battle with the enemy is terrifying, moving from an ominous, baleful verbal conflict to a pitched, physical, life-threatening battle. Compelling and accessible. (Fantasy. 9-12) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
