Review by New York Times Review
SUMMER BRINGS with it car trips - or, as they are otherwise known, yawning vacancies of hours. Consider it a service to your family to load up on the audiobooks now, so you can pop them in whenever the kids need beguiling. Begin by reintroducing them to Hans Christian Andersen - but only after forgetting everything you learned about him from Disney or Danny Kaye. There is, in fact, nothing benign about the great Dane. Thumbelina is kidnapped from the woman who grows her in a tulip from a grain of barley and nearly coerced into marriages with, sequentially, a toad and a mole. (Was Kenneth Grahame eavesdropping?) The Little Mermaid, desperate to meet her beloved prince on dry land, allows a witch to cut out her tongue in exchange for a pair of feet, which give her the sensation of walking on knives. The Steadfast Tin Soldier is swallowed by a fish and tossed into a fire. As for the Little Match Girl, literature has never provided a more depressing New Year's Eve, or a more compelling argument for child-labor laws. With that caveat in mind, HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN'S FAIRY TALES (Listening Library, 5 Hours, 50 minutes), narrated with surprising restraint by F. Murray Abraham and abetted by a cast of brightly pitched voice actors, offers just the kind of lush, unexpurgated introduction to the classic storyteller that any preteen book lover can warm to. Andersen's penchant for scene-setting and digression can push the running time of some stories toward the one-hour mark ("The Little Mermaid") and beyond ("The Snow Queen"). But "The Princess and the Pea," with its 20 mattresses and 20 eiderdown quilts, clocks in at a fleet three minutes, and reminds us in closing that "the pea was exhibited in the royal museum, and you can go there and see it, if it hasn't been stolen." It was no prop, the little book that Khizr Khan whipped out during his high-octane critique of Donald J. Trump at the 2016 Democratic National Convention. For years, Khan had made a point of carrying around pocket Constitutions just like it and passing them out to visitors at his Virginia home like calling cards. That deep-dyed patriotism now finds perhaps its most natural form in THIS IS OUR CONSTITUTION (Listening Library, 4 Hours, 16 minutes), Khan's concise and lucid middle-grade primer. In addition to gleaning the why and wherefore behind America's foundational document, teenage listeners will meet up with the Declaration of Independence and a roster of seminal Supreme Court decisions. The actor Sunil Malhotra capably voices the book's nitty-grittier sections, but it is Khan's weighty and lightly sorrowful timbre - and his lived perspective as a Pakistani immigrant - that bookend the work and color each sentence. Reflecting on the most recent election, he refers obliquely to "certain politicians" who "encouraged ugly prejudices," but no scores are settled here, and, wherever possible, Khan leans toward hope: "I know the Constitution will endure because I've seen the dignity and the decency of the American people." The heroine of Rachel Hartman's TESS OF THE ROAD (Listening Library, 16 Hours, 15 minutes) is, to hear her family members tell it, a "spank magnet," "singularly and spectacularly flawed, subject to sins a normal girl should never have been prone to." And if these descriptions haven't already put you on her side, consider that she has a prig for a mother, a half-dragon for an older sister and a goody-goody twin who, unlike Tess, is marrying the man of her dreams. Tess celebrates that wedding by bloodying the nose of one of her new relations. Threatened with confinement in a nunnery, she takes to the road, where she adopts both a male disguise (shades of "As You Like It") and a newly-male traveling companion, Pathka, from the hermaphroditic dragon subspecies known as quigutl. Gender and its discontents indeed form the central theme of Hartman's entertaining picaresque, which picks up where her two previous fantasy novels, "Seraphina" and "Shadow Scale," left off: in a medieval world shot through with modern concerns. The book takes its time getting on the highway, and the slow pace is exacerbated by Katharine McEwan's demure and deliberate narration, which drains some of the pungency from Hartman's prose. In the end, the sly wit of lines like "dying took commitment. It was easier to go on living incompetently" may register better on the page than in the earbuds. I confess I had fun imagining the elevator pitch for Henry Lien's fantasy debut: "It's Hermione Granger meets 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' meets the Ice Capades meets 'Mean Girls.' " For all its disparate ingredients, though, PEASPROUT CHEN: FUTURE LEGEND OF SKATE AND SWORD (Macmillan Audio, 9 Hours, 8 minutes) speaks in a single, strong voice, thanks to its spirited heroine, a parentless girl of 14 who has traveled to the glistening city of Pearl with the goal of mastering wu liu, "the beautiful and deadly art of martial skating." Dreaming of glory, she enrolls with her little brother, Cricket, at Pearl Famous Academy, where, according to one sensei, "the effectiveness of our institution's curriculum is directly proportional to the misery of the student." The narrator, Nancy Wu, finds just the right blade edge between girlish naivete and brashness for our protagonist, who isn't about to be cowed by teenage queen bees or distracted by romance, and who registers her nearconstant displeasure with epithets like "Ten thousand years of stomach gas!" (She also believes that "boys who have dimples overuse them," which is empirically true.) When we last saw Roz - known to her makers as "ROZZUM unit 7134" - in Peter Brown's 2016 novel, "The Wild Robot," she was a battered hunk of steel being airlifted from her island home for repairs and rebooting. In the opening pages of THE WILD ROBOT ESCAPES (Hachette Audio, 4 Hours, 36 minutes), Brown's equally charming sequel, she turns up nearly good as new at the Shareef farm, where her ability to speak to animals in their native tongues makes her a natural for wrangling livestock. But in the midst of her thriving new career, Roz is dogged by an old sorrow - the adopted gosling-son she was forced to leave behind - as well as an ever-present fear that if her human owners learn what's behind her metallic facade, they'll destroy her. "And that is why, when the time is right," she resolves, "I will try to escape." How she goes about that improbable mission, and with whose help, makes for a touching and suspenseful tale, even for listeners who are coming to Brown's heroine for the first time. The narrator, Kathleen Mclnerney, is adept at finding the warm pulse beneath Roz's monotone delivery, and the array of old-school radio sound effects - clicks and squeaks and moos and honks - gives "The Wild Robot Escapes" a texture beyond words. Best of all, listeners get a bonus PDF of Brown's spooky and evocative black-andwhite illustrations. Robots, dragons, martial ice-skaters, Hans Christian Andersen and the wonders of the United States Constitution. Consider it a healthy harvest of summer entertainment for your kids. And, if you're so inclined, keep the same audiobooks around for your own leisure breaks (should they ever arise). louis bayard is the author, most recently, of "Lucky Strikes."
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [June 3, 2018]
Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Brown merely whetted readers' appetites for adventure with the exploits of kind, brave Roz in The Wild Robot (2016), particularly given the robot's dramatic departure from her island home. In this stellar sequel, Roz powers up, repaired and with memories intact, on a family farm, which she has been purchased to run. While she gives every appearance of being a normal robot, Roz constantly dreams of returning home. By speaking with animals, Roz gets word of her plight to a young goose named Brightbill, her adoptive son, and he flies to her rescue. With the help of the farmer's children, Roz and Brightbill flee, but their success is far from assured. Wolves, watery expanses, bustling cities, and old enemies the RECO robots all stand in their way, and Brown's protagonists confront each in exhilarating and heart-stopping ways. Warmth and gentleness course through the novel, even as dangers emerge. Roz isn't programmed for violence, and the narrator acts as an honest and reassuring friend who periodically breaks from storytelling to explain difficult truths to young readers. The novel's near-future setting gives rise to questions pertaining to the division between humans and machines as well as the idea that different isn't the same as defective. Though illustrations were unavailable for review, Brown's artistic talents should only elevate his exceptional conclusion to Roz's saga. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: The Wild Robot was a runaway success, so expect nothing less of its sequel.--Smith, Julia Copyright 2018 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
In the thought-provoking sequel to Brown's middle-grade debut, The Wild Robot, the adventure picks up as the resilient Roz (short for ROZZUM unit 7134) is repaired and shipped off to Hilltop Farm. With its domesticated animals and whirring machines, the dairy farm is a far cry from the remote island that the robot has come to call home. Though her owner, Mr. Shareef, and his two children come to embrace Roz as part of the family, she is desperate to make her way back to the island and her adopted gosling son, Brightbill. Seeking their help, Roz confides in the Shareef children that she is not like other robots and asks them, "Is being different the same as being defective?" The robot's odyssey-which brings her from the countryside to the big city, where she comes face-to-face with her designer-raises poignant quandaries about the nature of love and selfhood. While such questions remain unresolved, Roz emerges as a striking symbol of humanity for the very reason that she poses and ponders them. Final art not seen by PW. Ages 8-12. Agent: Paul Rodeen, Rodeen Literary Management (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 3-6-The lovable robot, Roz (The Wild Robot), was last seen being ripped away from her goose son, Brightbill, and hauled unwillingly back to the factory for the Makers to repair and reassign her. She is reactivated on Hilltop Farm, where Mr. Shareef expects her to tend to farm duties, including caring for the many cows and making repairs around the farm. She is programmed to obey orders, including those from Mr. Shareef's children, Jaya and Jad. Roz is homesick for her prior life on the remote island with her goose son, and all of her other animal friends, but she feels trapped, and fears Mr. Shareef will find out her secret-that she is "defective" and able to think, plan, and speak the languages of the animals. Roz is torn: while she enjoys helping on the farm and spending time with the children, she desires a reunion with her son even more. With the children's help and blessing, and the cows' assistance, Roz develops an escape plan. Readers need not have read the first installment to enjoy this sequel, though fans will root for Roz and Brightbill's reunion. Brown's illustrative talent is featured in black-and-white drawings throughout. -VERDICT Science fiction meets fantasy in this delightful sequel that gives readers a unique look into what technology could someday have in store. A must-buy for any middle grade collection.-Michele Shaw, Quail Run Elementary School, San Ramon, CA © Copyright 2018. 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
Roz (The Wild Robot) has a new life as a farm robot, but nice as everyone is there, she longs to return to her island and her goose-son, Brightbill. With obstacles predictably paced and easily overcome, this sequel lacks tension, but gentle Rozs fans will be happy to see that she gets home. Spot and full-page grayscale illustrations once again add to the story's atmosphere. (c) Copyright 2019. 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
Roz, a robot who learned to adapt to life among wild creatures in her first outing, seeks to return to the island she calls home.Brown's sequel to The Wild Robot (2016) continues an intriguing premise: What would happen to a robot after challenges in an unexpected environment cause it to evolve in unusual ways? As this book opens, Roz is delivered to a farm where she helps a widower with two young children run a dairy operation that has been in his family for generations. Roz reveals her backstory to the cows, who are supportive of the robot's determination to return to the island and to her adopted son, the goose Brightbill. The cows, the children, and finally Brightbill himself come to Roz's aid. The focus on Roz's escape from human control results in a somewhat solemn and episodic narrative, with an extended journey and chase after Roz leaves the farm. Dr. Molovo, a literal deus ex machina, appears near the end of the story to provide a means of rescue. She is Roz's designer/creator, and, intrigued by the robot's adaptation and evolution but cognizant of the threat that those achievements might represent to humans, she assists Roz and Brightbill in their quest. The satisfactory (if inevitable-feeling) conclusion may prompt discussion about individual agency and determination, whether for robots or people.If not as effervescent as Roz's first outing, it is still a provocatively contemplative one. (Fiction. 8-11) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
