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adamskiboy528491 's review for:
The Unadoptables
by Hana Tooke
Losing your parents is no fun. Being with your friends is another story. [b:The Unadoptables|51838643|The Unadoptables|Hana Tooke|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1583882431l/51838643._SX50_.jpg|72922909] by [a:Hana Tooke|19473508|Hana Tooke|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1566126762p2/19473508.jpg] is like if A Series of Unfortunate Events had a worthy successor!
In the late 1880s, five children (Lotta, Egg, Fenna, Sem and the lead character Milou) escape from a neglectful orphanage & a sinister gentleman who wants to tear them apart & embark on an adventure with hunting werewolves to hot air balloon specialists, clockmakers & marionette masters. It's a doorstopper of a book that delivers the best brand of the adventure genre. I love the 19th-century style illustrations thanks to Ayesha L. Rubio - it makes you want to visit Amsterdam! Each character is so unique in their role of being different from one another. Lotta has twelve fingers, Fenna is mute, Sem has clumsy ears, Egg has East-Asian ancestry, and Milou has a wild attitude.
A stunningly large number of heroes and their coteries lack in the parent department, either through death or in that they just aren't talked about. Even if both parents are alive, they may well be emotionally or physically distant. This is a very convenient way for characters to be able to run off in the middle of the night to fight Evil, get sucked into another world, etc. without having anyone responsible for them making a fuss. One of the first things a creator of stories about children or teens having adventures needs to do is explain a lack of parental involvement. There are so many twists & turns in this book; I don't want to give anything else away.
A large sum of people has criticised the use of the title as it being offensive. But a reminder, this is only a work of fiction. These unfortunate implications of disabilities & stereotypes are unlikely to happen in children's literature, though. The children (both in-universe & out-universe) can sometimes have different strengths and flaws which round them out and make them generally equal to the rest of the characters. In summary, it's a lovely tale full of friendship & adventure that deserves to be on every child's lap.