by Gennifer Choldenko
Rating: *** (3 stars)
Age group: 9+
Type: Fantasy (ish, more entirely and totally fiction)
India (a moody teenager), Finn (a twelve-year-old), and Mouse (6-year-old genius) Tompkins have lost their home. With a dead father and a mother who is a teacher, they have to move out. First, they have to leave their dog, Henry, at home. Then their mother announces to them that she is going to be living with them--but not at first. She gets to stay in their area, whereas India, Finn, and Mouse need to go live with their Uncle Red in Colorado. Colorado! So they fly there only to be picked up by a fake, 12-year-old "grown-up" who drives (!) a pink car with feathers stuck on it. He drives them to Falling Bird, a very mysteriously weird place where you get your own house, but only, apparently, for a little while. Then India gets enlisted as a welcomer for Falling Bird and Finn and Mouse are left on their own to rescue India and find the mysterious black box before time runs out.
This book is totally unrealistic but is not supposed to be realistic. I liked it pretty much but at the end it gets incredibly complicated. At least for me it does. But still it gets complicated at the end. And it alternates between India, Finn, and Mouse telling the story, though, so if you are not paying attention, you could get confused. All in all, this book is good.
You might like this book if you like suspensey-fiction-fantasy, or just fiction-fantasy.
PARENTAL SECTION
Sexual parts: None
Violence: none, but a crazy fireball yes
Fighting: Not really but kind of, a little bit
Pregnancy: Non
Kissing and Romance: none
Stealing: not really except Finn and Mouse take a domesticated animal for their own good
Vandalizing: none
