March 1, 2023
Knights-in-training Tim and Belinda undertake a terrifying sea voyage to fetch a golden fleece and a few other treasures. Mostly what's terrifying is that they have Sir Fass, Sir Render, and the rest of the Kingdom of Merryland's inept, aptly named, and, as it turns out, treacherous Knight Brigade as shipmates...though surviving such nautical hazards as sirens, not to mention Scylla and Charybdis, are (not unlike a monstrous bargleboar, whose allergy to paprika leaves everyone covered in snot) nothing to sneeze at. Cribbing blithely from ancient sources but working in some inventive twists of his own--the song of the sirens, for instance, is so awful that rather than luring sailors to their deaths, it results in them wrecking their ships to avoid hearing it--Gibbs steers his young adventurers from one near disaster to the next before doing readers the disservice of leaving the pair hurtling toward certain death on the last page. As in previous outings, Curtis adds comical line drawings of knights in armor grimacing or looking confused to nearly every spread, and the author pauses the action periodically to define relevant vocabulary building words like overcompensating, nauseous, and (irritatingly) cliffhanger. Most of the cast presents White in the interior art, though Belinda appears to be Black. More knightly shenanigans, tongue deeply in cheek. (Fantasy. 10-12)
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