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Summary
Summary
"The invention never flags." -- Booklist (starred review)
In this third weird and wacky installment of National Book Award winner M. T. Anderson's Pals in Peril series, Jasper Dash and his friends must unravel a terrible mystery.
It is a land of wonders. It is a land of mystery. It is a land that time forgot (or chose specifically not to remember). Cut off from the civilized world for untold years by prohibitive interstate tolls at the New Jersey border, this land is called: Delaware. It is into the mist-shrouded heart of this forbidden mountainous realm that our plucky and intrepid heroes, Jasper Dash: Boy Technonaut, and his friends Lily Gefelty and Katie Mulligan, must journey to solve yet another a mystery. Come along on a tale of grand adventure that includes in its pages: Lost cities! Tentacles! Monks! Dinosaurs! Cheap suits! Eye Doctors! And, of course, the fabled Curse of the Jaguar!
Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-8-Jasper Dash is his school's last hope in the all-important Stare-Eyes Championship against their archrivals. Alas, the Boy Technonaut's concentration is interrupted mid-match when he receives a telepathic cry for help. His team blames their defeat on Jasper's loss of focus, but he is convinced that there is something unnatural about the opposing team. With his fellow sleuths Katie and Lily, he follows the Stare-Eyes squad back to the wild realm of Delaware. Long cut off from civilization by exorbitant toll-road charges, it is a dangerous region of lofty mountains, impenetrable jungles, and exotic cities, ruled by a crazed military dictator. In the hidden monastery where the man once studied, Jasper and his friends find that his old teachers are hostages. The crooks are using the monastery's arcane powers to create an indestructible army. What can our heroes do to stop a horde of thugs-especially when the monks are vowed to nonviolence? Detailed black-and-white illustrations, reminiscent of slightly skewed medieval woodcuts, add to the exotic atmosphere. Like the chums' previous exploits, this off-the-wall parody of Stratemeyer-style series fiction features mock-heroic dialogue, breakneck chases and battles, hairsbreadth escapes, and fiendish (if rather inept) villains. Along the way, there are lots of sly digs at rah-rah sports novels, gangster pulps, and even travel guidebooks. The author frequently "breaks page" to address readers directly with side comments, hints, and suggestions. Beneath all the absurdity, there is also a quiet message about loyalty and self-acceptance.-Elaine E. Knight, Lincoln Elementary Schools, IL (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Horn Book Review
(Intermediate, Middle School) This spoof of foreign adventure novels is Indiana Jones on overload. While friends Jasper, Katie, and Lily -- stars of previous series entries Whales on Stilts (rev. 3/05) and The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen (rev. 5/06) -- go about their usual business of saving the world, Anderson stuffs every scene with exotic setting details: dark cobblestone alleys, colorful street vendors, six-armed acrobats, chattering monkeys, "the snakes with women's heads, the women with snakes' heads, that whole thing." That the mystical locale described is the state of Delaware, which the author/narrator confesses never to have visited except for a brief stint on its tollways while driving to New Jersey, gives the story an added layer of absurdity. A contest between high school "competitive staring" teams begins the nonsense, setting off a chain of events in which throwback adventure-series hero Jasper convinces Katie and Lily to accompany him to "the ancient, eldritch mountains of Delaware" to help monks retrieve stolen artifacts. Young readers might not see through the swirling mountain mists to Anderson's sharp critique of how Western writers tend to exoticize other cultures. Nevertheless, they'll enjoy journeying deep into the heart of darkest Delaware -- and they won't even have to pay the tolls. From HORN BOOK, (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Kirkus Review
Metafiction at its most weirdly satisfying. Anderson began his Thrilling Tales in 2005 with a slight not-quite-200-pager called Whales on Stilts, then followed it the next year with the rather longer Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen. Each was populated by the trio of Jasper Dash, Boy Technonaut, star of his own adventure-book series (that no one reads any more), Katie Mulligan, star of the Horror Hollow stories, and Lily Gefelty, "who observed things constantly and thought complicated things about what she saw." This far longer tome finds Jasper returning to save the mountaintop monastery where he learned martial arts in deepest Delaware. There is no way to summarize a plot that includes shards of and snarks at Eragon, Tom Swift, chick lit and sports novels, Galaxy Quest and Indiana Jones movies and so on. Extremely funny, it's for adults, who will get at least half the references, and for children, who will get the other half. Cyrus's illustrations are integral and pretty darn amusing, too. (Fiction. 9-14) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Great Pyramids of Snefru, chums, they're back! Yes, Jasper Dash, Boy Technonaut, and his intrepid pals the venturesome Katie and the retiring Lily return for yet another thrilling adventure (following Whales on Stilts, 2005, and The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen, 2006). This time around the gang are off (via Jasper's Gyroscopic Sky Suite) to exotic Delaware in search of a ruthless band of art thieves who are plundering priceless artifacts from the monastery of Vbngoom (that would be the one that's hidden in a mountain range in northern Delaware). A mountain range in Delaware? Yes, readers, this is Delaware as you've never known it, replete with towering mountains, icky squid monsters, levitating monks, and the like. After all, as Katie notes, Jasper does have a penchant for finding places that most people can't find. Come to think of it, so does Anderson, as he drolly demonstrates in yet another relentlessly imaginative and laff-filled adventure that is his own sui generis marriage of Indiana Jones and Tom Swift (is that legal in Delaware?). The invention never flags from an opening Stare-Eyes competition (Jasper can stare like nobody else) to a thrilling, concluding encounter with the Technonaut's archenemy, the interdimensional criminal Bobby Spandrell. And don't miss Fair Delaware, the appended state song (words and music by M. T. Anderson, of course!).--Cart, Michael Copyright 2009 Booklist