Review: Wonderscape

Arthur is a nimble-minded, science-loving thirteen-year-old living in your average housing estate. He is not high in the friend stakes but just he and his dad enjoy a peaceful enough life. Arthur's main priorities include keeping a low profile at school and avoiding confrontation at all costs, both of which are challenged when one morning on the way to school he witnesses a mysterious explosion.

Arthur is not alone. Renegade bad girl, Ren and fashionista, Cecily also happen to be in front of number Twenty-seven when it implodes destroying the garden gnomes out front and potentially wounding a cute ball of canine fluff.

Following the dog into the damaged house, the three unwittingly embark on an adventure of a lifetime. Somehow they and the dog, Cloud, are sucked into another dimension and…time. It is now the year 2473 and the trio are trapped in Wonderscape, a mega in-reality adventure game that is something altogether different from 21st Century VR. To progress from realm to realm, country to country, galaxy to galaxy, Arthur, Ren and Cecily must use their combined wits and physical endurance to complete challenges that reward them with realm keys that open the portals from one realm to another. It’s a heart racing experience. Challenges are cloaked in riddles and fraught with dangers, plus there’s the added pressure of competing against dozens of other Wonderers.

What makes their quest all the more thrilling and desperate is the fact that they if they fail to find the special time key within 57 hours, they will dissolve into snotty slime.  Not an attractive prospect especially since they are already hopelessly late for school.

Fortunately our time travelling trio are not alone. Within each realm they discover an historical hero figure from the past, famous for their scientific brilliance or combative heroism and more. Some of these characters will be familiar to tween readers, Thomas Edison for instance. Others are not so widely well-known but just as fascinating like: Amaros Ba and Wangari Maathai (Google them if you like!) With the aid of their genius (and some rather natty Wondercloaks), Arthur and the girls learn to work as a team while soaking up some serious historic and future wisdoms along the way.

Wonderscape is a stirring mix of familiarity and futuristic fun that leaves you teetering on the edge of your seats… or mountain precipice or train carriage as the challenge may be. Cracking with time-sensitive tension and action, this adventure tale will entertain and awaken the gamer within ten-year-olds and above. It evokes a sense of being your own hero and reassures youngsters that friendships are not necessarily forged from similarities but rather shared experiences and understanding.  This read is definitely worth walking through a Wondergate for.

Title: Wonderscape
Author: Jennifer Bell
Publisher: Walker Books, $14.99 
Publication Date: June 2020
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 9781406391725
For ages: 9 – 14
Type: Middle Grade Novel

Buy the Book: Walker Books Australia, Booktopia, Boomerang Books


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: The Goldfish Boy

Image
Twelve-year-old Matthew Corbin is your regular pre-teen boy living in an unspectacular cul-de-sac deep in British suburbia. The major difference between him and the other inhabitants of Chestnut Close however is the state of his red-raw hands and tortured mind and the fact that he barely steps outside his terraced-home second story bedroom. Matthew is afflicted with severe Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, OCD and can barely function as a result. From his fishbowl vantage point, Matthew keeps track of his neighbours, dutifully recording their every movement, their comings and goings, and their habitual rituals in his notebooks. In this way we are introduced to the residents and their characteristic irks and quirks from the get go in a way that is both intriguing and comical. Matthew’s observations allude to his condition; he is both analytical and detailed in his approach. The orderliness of his notations suggest a mind used to repetition and accuracy, an intense desire to ‘get things r
Read more

Review: My Shadow Is Pink

Image
What are little boys made of? Is it really frogs and snails ; everything that is not sugar and spice and all things nice that are otherwise attributed to the makeup of girls? Should blue be the only shade that maketh the man? Debut author illustrator, Scott Stuart blows these outdated tropes well and truly out of the water with this deliriously amusing and tender picture book, My Shadow is Pink . Our intrepid main character’s little face is a picture of consternation after he concedes that his shadow is not the strong blue that trails the other males in his family. His is a delicate shade of rose and mirrors that which he loves most: sparkles, dancing, twirling and dressing up. Despite his father’s reassurances that his shadow will adopt a more ‘manly’ appearance one of these days , and the little boy’s own yearning to fit in with the other acceptable shadow groups, he is unable to dismiss his conflicting feelings. Then one day an invitation to let his shadow dress up in its favour
Read more

Christmas Countdown Day 3 - The Grandest Bookshop in the World

Image
The Grandest Bookshop in the World It’s something I’ve always wanted to do – live in a bookshop and be surrounded by the magic of words and other spellbinding things, like cake. Siblings Pearl and Vally Cole are living that dream. But it’s not just any old bookshop; it’s the Cole’s Book Arcade in Melbourne. Their fantastical story germinates from their father’s own stirring rags to riches tale and meanders closely to the actual chronological time line of the eccentric Edward Cole, founder of Coles Book Arcade in the late 1800s. The key thing to remember be you staff, family member or patron of the Arcade is that buying a book is secondary to enjoying your visitation. Customers are encouraged to relax, read, dine on tantalising fare, wander through the exotic gardens harbouring monkeys, or perhaps select a curious toy for a well-behaved youngster. These fascinations really did exist and in the Cole children’s thrilling tale form the critical backdrops to their chilling (fictional) a
Read more