Review by Booklist Review
Biggerborough has everything that a medieval city could want, and everybody who is anybody lives there. Embarrassingly, Charlie doesn't live there. She wants to rescue citizens, save buildings from destruction, and banish monsters with the other knights, but she has never left her tiny, rundown town of Little Import. One day, the baker complains of a gluttonous fiend wreaking havoc on his bakery, and Charlie uses her brains to capture a Triple-Tier Hungerbeak. Inspired, she proceeds to catch the Frenzied Mudbull eating the farmer's crops, the Archbacked Spandragon blocking the duck pond, and more, until one day she realizes Little Import is no longer the shabby town it once was. The story is simple, with a diverse cast, and it includes some fun, Where's Waldo?--style visual hunting. The words use a mix of text, speech bubbles, and banners with a medieval font, which will appeal to early graphic-novel readers. But most of all, Batsel's artwork is a mesmerizing display of extraordinary mixed-media collage using a variety of handmade and purchased paper alongside paints, ink, watercolors, embroidery floss, artificial turf, and painted sawdust. Every page, down to the endpapers, is textured, rich, layered, and lovely. Batsel's second book as author-illustrator is quite the achievement.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Batsel's medieval-inspired tale follows knight Charlie as she vanquishes the hidden-in-plain-sight monsters of her small town, called Little Import. Though "knights were supposed to slay monsters," young Charlie--portrayed in full armor--has only ever read about them. Compared to nearby Biggerborough, "Little Import just wasn't worth a monster's time." When Charlie overhears the neighborhood baker lamenting the havoc wreaked by a "gluttonous fiend," it catalyzes an aha moment, and she bags the town's first brute--layer cake--lookalike "Triple-Tier Hungerbeak." Before long, the whole village, populated by residents of varying skin tones, comes knocking for help with creatures including a wheelbarrow-esque "Frenzied Mudbull" and a bridge-like "Arch-Backed Spandragon." Readers are provided with descriptions of each monster, disguised as everyday objects, before a page turn identifies the various fiends (a grandfather clock, for example, turns out to be a "furious thundergong"). The result is a playfully interactive story that suggests the grass isn't always greener somewhere else. Ages 5--9. (Sept.)
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
A young knight finds worthy work with help from sympathetic neighbors--and a fertile imagination. So quiet is the tiny town of Little Import that all wannabe knight Charlie knows about monsters is what she's read in her Big Book of Beastly Brutes. But that turns out to be enough to recognize the "Triple-Tier Hungerbeak," disguised as a cake in the nibbled-over bakery; the "Frenzied Mudbull," which only looks like a wheelbarrow in a harried neighbor's plundered garden; the ticking "Furious Thundergong," whose hourly chime is keeping the potion shop's exhausted owner awake; and several more boojums. In collages made from embroidery floss, cut paper, sawdust painted green, and like materials, the author depicts common items transforming in stages into fearsome beasts before being "captured" by a small, anonymous figure in full armor and marched off…not to be slain, but settled in a monster sanctuary that becomes a popular attraction and gives Little Import bragging rights over neighboring Biggerborough. Along with racially diverse human figures, Batsel also tucks a marauding mouse in the bakery, a rabbit in the garden, and other rewards for sharp-eyed observers to pick out of her detail-rich scenes. Charlie keeps her closed helmet on even when otherwise dressed in a onesie and so remains racially indeterminate. (This book was reviewed digitally.) Tongue-in-cheek and not at all of little import. (Picture book. 6-8) Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
