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lessa_riel's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
2.25
larrys's review
3.0
An Australasian hit from the late 1990s. That makes it historical fiction, I guess.
It has that distinctly Australian voice and sort of slapstick humour shared by other media such as Muriel's Wedding, though I'd describe this story as Australian Stephen King for middle graders.
I grew tired of Paul Jennings' stories when I taught at a girls' high school in New Zealand and we had to do these read-alouds in formtime because read-alouds help with literacy. These read-alouds were chosen by the librarians -- or had been, once upon a time. And because the photocopy budget was tight, and because this was before the days of BYOD and interactive whiteboards, I had to read whatever was provided. The Paul Jennings stories were good hi-lo readers and this was a low decile school, and I can tell you the 13-14 year old girls were totally bored by them. Looking back, I wish I'd had the time and resources to source some age and gender appropriate read-aloud material for form time -- but that was time I only had once I'd given up teaching. The irony. I never had time to read for pleasure when I taught high school English.
This story is co-written by two of Australia's superstar male children's authors and they've been best friends for years, so I shouldn't have been surprised at how similar their voices are. Jennings wrote the chapters from the girl's point of view and Gleitzman wrote the chapters from the boy's point of view. I think the voices of the characters are too similar. I kept forgetting whose chapter I was reading. Yet, amazingly, they were written by two different people. You'd think the authors wouldn't have had that particular problem.
"Big Bad Dawn" is an example of the stout strength trope, or possibly acrofatics -- we're told she's very big, numerous times, and the boy is constantly amazed at how strong and flexible she is when really put to the test. This is an early iteration of the 'strong female hero', which has since become a bit more subtle with variants -- a physically strong girl in fiction is no longer 'dog bites man' interesting, I hope. Also, I don't think it's helpful to anyone, ever, to constantly be referring to a girl's BMI. Do we hear anything about the boy's BMI? Nope. Boys more often get a pass. It's mainly girls' bodies which are down for extra scrutiny, even when it's not sexualised.
The impersonal conflict comes from the infestation of apple-head worms, but the interpersonal conflict comes from the newly minted step-brother and sister MCs. Perhaps their similar voices are intentional, because they're really very similar in personality, and over the course of this first section of novel, they learn to band together to fight an outside enemy. In effect, the main conflict derives from the fact that Dawn is a girl (who screams at gross things) and Rory is a boy (who finds it tiresome that Dawn screams at gross things). Kids who haven't grown utterly tired of this kind of inter-gender drama may still really enjoy this series, though I wouldn't go out of my way to provide these to young readers. I can't be arsed reading the rest of the series, which is really the rest of the novel. (A strange publishing choice.) My daughter read the first one a few years ago and didn't read them either.
With books like these it's always, do I donate them to her primary school or just chuck them in the bin?
It has that distinctly Australian voice and sort of slapstick humour shared by other media such as Muriel's Wedding, though I'd describe this story as Australian Stephen King for middle graders.
I grew tired of Paul Jennings' stories when I taught at a girls' high school in New Zealand and we had to do these read-alouds in formtime because read-alouds help with literacy. These read-alouds were chosen by the librarians -- or had been, once upon a time. And because the photocopy budget was tight, and because this was before the days of BYOD and interactive whiteboards, I had to read whatever was provided. The Paul Jennings stories were good hi-lo readers and this was a low decile school, and I can tell you the 13-14 year old girls were totally bored by them. Looking back, I wish I'd had the time and resources to source some age and gender appropriate read-aloud material for form time -- but that was time I only had once I'd given up teaching. The irony. I never had time to read for pleasure when I taught high school English.
This story is co-written by two of Australia's superstar male children's authors and they've been best friends for years, so I shouldn't have been surprised at how similar their voices are. Jennings wrote the chapters from the girl's point of view and Gleitzman wrote the chapters from the boy's point of view. I think the voices of the characters are too similar. I kept forgetting whose chapter I was reading. Yet, amazingly, they were written by two different people. You'd think the authors wouldn't have had that particular problem.
"Big Bad Dawn" is an example of the stout strength trope, or possibly acrofatics -- we're told she's very big, numerous times, and the boy is constantly amazed at how strong and flexible she is when really put to the test. This is an early iteration of the 'strong female hero', which has since become a bit more subtle with variants -- a physically strong girl in fiction is no longer 'dog bites man' interesting, I hope. Also, I don't think it's helpful to anyone, ever, to constantly be referring to a girl's BMI. Do we hear anything about the boy's BMI? Nope. Boys more often get a pass. It's mainly girls' bodies which are down for extra scrutiny, even when it's not sexualised.
The impersonal conflict comes from the infestation of apple-head worms, but the interpersonal conflict comes from the newly minted step-brother and sister MCs. Perhaps their similar voices are intentional, because they're really very similar in personality, and over the course of this first section of novel, they learn to band together to fight an outside enemy. In effect, the main conflict derives from the fact that Dawn is a girl (who screams at gross things) and Rory is a boy (who finds it tiresome that Dawn screams at gross things). Kids who haven't grown utterly tired of this kind of inter-gender drama may still really enjoy this series, though I wouldn't go out of my way to provide these to young readers. I can't be arsed reading the rest of the series, which is really the rest of the novel. (A strange publishing choice.) My daughter read the first one a few years ago and didn't read them either.
With books like these it's always, do I donate them to her primary school or just chuck them in the bin?
mrspinach's review
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
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