Language: PG (2 swears); Mature Content: PG; Violence PG-13
BUYING ADVISORY: EL, MS - OPTIONAL
AUDIENCE APPEAL: AVERAGE
Magdalys and her friends are flying south into the war zone to find her brother, who has gone missing during a battle. Magdalys can wrangle dinosaurs, and flies atop a dactyl. The Confederacy is doing a better job of wrangling dinosaurs, and in one showdown, Magdalyse, a 12yo black girl, battles Elizabeth Crawbell, a white 16yo turncoat, who is sitting side saddle on her archaeops, wearing a ball gown and pink and white raptorskin boots. Magdalys may be the key to helping the Union, though she’s not wild about it.
Using dinosaurs in the Civil War is an intriguing premise. I liked that Magdalys and her varied ethnic group of associates are those perhaps too often overlooked or under represented in history books. I wanted to like this book more. The Civil War is pretty grim stuff for a 12yo protagonist, especially when she sees her friend take his first life and when she kills for the first time. She also sees people blown up next to her. Besides dealing with the horrors of war, Magdalys is an orphan, her brother is missing, and she is deeply into the injustices of slavery coupled with the oppression of other minorities, such as Native Americans. I’m not sure how a 12yo is supposed to process all of that and still get up in the morning, let alone feel like the burden of winning or losing battles falls on her young dino-guiding shoulders. There were a lot of names to process, which made the book confusing. I also struggled with having the fate of the Civil War rest on an angry teenager. The ending seemed to be tied up in an implausible bow that sets up the next book.
Michelle in the Middle, Teacher
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