From School Library Journal
Grade 6-8?Patneaude's curious collection of six short stories set mostly in the Pacific Northwest falls a little short of Twilight Zone eeriness (two selections have no supernatural elements at all), but still includes enough of those elements to make some of the tales compelling, especially to hi/lo readers. Each tale presents a gentle, wistful search for a perfect world free of real?or imagined?monsters. Most of the protagonists are junior-high students; each narrator chronicles a special event that helped him or her get through a tough adolescent time. Plots revolve around problems such as divorce, moving into a new house, a dying relative, saving the whales, and confronting bedroom fears. Jimi Hendrix, a spaceship, a victim of racism, a ghostly runner, and an alter-ego clown all play roles in these stories that occasionally flirt with sentimentality. On the whole, a mixed bag.?John Sigwald, Unger Memorial Library, Plainview, TX
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Booklist
Gr. 5^-8. Readers too young for Stephen King will find satisfaction in these six tales in which the encounters with the unknown are beneficent yet still mildly eerie. Isaac wins an important invitational cross-country meet only to discover his running mate and trainer is a ghost. Cort, a young saxophone player, develops a special relationship with a trapped orca. Even though some of the tales telegraph their outcome, others are tautly woven. Patneaude keeps his action tight and quickly establishes character to provide young readers with interesting, short, vicarious adventures into the mysteries of this world and beyond. Linda Ward-Callaghan
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
