10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Crazy Fun Grandma, May 16, 2009
This review is from: Nana Cracks the Case! (Hardcover)
I bought this book for my eight year old niece, and she loved it. I loved it too. The way Nana and the kids do everything but follow the plotline they're supposed to follow is utterly charming. And there are so many funny little things. I just opened it up to take a look before wrapping it, and I ended up reading the whole thing. Now when I see my niece she always makes an excuse to say, "I plop forgot."
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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Detective Grandma and Her Not-So-Angelic Grandkids, May 17, 2009
This review is from: Nana Cracks the Case! (Hardcover)
It seems a guy named Cabell Harris (great name!) came up with this concept and Kathleen Lane ended up writing it, with Sarah Horne doing the illustrations. I'm not sure who made these arrangements, but then Lane takes the ball and runs with it.
Did I say runs with it? Actually, Lane takes the ball, paints it purple, dribbles it down the aisles of the grocery store while the paint's still wet, and then lobs it through a neighbor's window. Next she chortles.
Every once in a while a children's book author presents a little old lady (or, less often, a little old man) as a sort of pseudo-kid or pseudo-adult--both, really. Considering how small, brilliant, and mischievous my own grandmother was clear into her nineties, this makes perfect sense to me. Here's how the back cover puts it:
"Nanas, you see, are not supposed to become backhoe operators or marine biologists or circus performers (actually Nana did not join the circus, she only substituted while the trapeze artist recovered from a broken leg), and they must never--because they are so very fragile, you see--become detectives."
More important, you should know that Nana has a book on her kitchen table called The Joy of Napping. The book jacket is a fake: it's there to fool her highly anxious daughter, the mother of her grandchildren. Beneath the false cover is Nana's real reading material, say, a book about tightrope walking. A lovely touch from our publishers is that if you turn the cover of Nana Cracks the Case over, you will see The Joy of Napping jacket, complete with yawner quotes like this one from Dusty McThud: "I can't believe I wasted so much time striving for excellence when I could have been napping instead."
Nana's grandchildren, Bog and Eufala, know her secret. Like Nana, the two kids devote a certain amount of energy to keeping their worrywart mother from worrying. And like Nana, they are highly talented troublemakers. For example, one of their mother's numerous rules is never to open the front door. So we read:
"And that is why Eufala and Bog did not open the front door. Never in a million years would they have so much as touched the doorknob of the front door.
Anyhow, why open the front door when the kitchen window worked just as well--and, they had found, was much less likely to draw the attention of the neighbors?"
Nana's new goal of becoming a police detective soon intersects with her grandchildren's latest activities, and shenanigans happily scramble across the pages for the rest of the book. One of the funniest things about Nana is that she continues to be a little old lady. She keeps forgetting things, never taking the direct route anywhere, a trend highlighted by the discrepancy between the author's words and the illustrations. And watch for how Nana handles the reporters at the crime scene.
There's a touch of Lemony Snicket here if you listen for it. But the book's humor stands on its own, giddily over the top.
I will tell you that Nana Cracks the Case is less invested in its mystery than some other mysteries for this age group (e.g., the Saxby Smart series); the author is having far too much fun with Nana and her devious grandkids for that. But it is a new favorite of mine in terms of sheer enjoyment. Edgar Awards, Schmedgar Awards--you've got to spend some time with the coolest grandma since the extreme sports granny in that animated movie, Hoodwinked.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Imaginative, funny, and so not your average formulaic kids' book, May 27, 2009
This review is from: Nana Cracks the Case! (Hardcover)
Nana is the wackiest, funniest, grandma ever. And she's hot... warm... cold on the trail of the Yumdum thief! This book is just plain weird! And that's a good thing, trust me.
It's a great book for kids - smart, kooky, doesn't talk down to them - but as an adult, I had just as much fun with it. And it's as wonderful to read for its voice as it is for crazy things that happen. I am so looking forward to finding out what Nana and her out of control grandkids (Eufala and Bog - what names!) get into next.
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