Sedgwick, Marcus 1968-

views updated Jun 11 2018

Sedgwick, Marcus 1968-

Personal

Born 1968, in England; married; children: Alice.

Addresses

Home—Sussex, England.

Career

Writer, beginning 1994; Walker Books, London, England, sales manager. Formerly worked as a bookseller for Heffers (children's bookshop), Cambridge, England; as a sales manager for Ragged Bears (children's book publisher), Somerset, England; and as an editor for Templar Publishing, Dorking, England. Stone carver and wood engraver; performer with International Band of Mystery ("Austin Powers" tribute band and acting troupe), as drummer Basil Exposition.

Awards, Honors

Branford Boase Award, 2000, for Floodland; Edgar Allan Poe Award nomination, Mystery Writers of America, Independent Reading Association award nomination, and Portsmouth Book Award nomination, all 2001, all for Witch Hill; Carnegie Medal shortlist, London Guardian Children's Fiction Prize shortlist, and Blue Peter Book Award shortlist, all 2002, all for The Dark Horse; Sheffield Book Award shortlist, Guardian Book Award nomination, and Edgar Allan Poe shortlist, all for The Book of Dead Days; Booktrusted Teenage Prize shortlist, Salford Book Award shortlist, Angus Book Award shortlist, Best Book for Young Adults designation, American Library Association, Portsmouth Book Award, North East Teenage Book Award, and Notable Tradebooks for Young People selection, National Council for the Social Studies, all 2007, all for The Foreshadowing; Booktrusted Teenage Book Prize, 2007, for My Swordhand Is Singing; Costa Children's Book Award shortlist, 2007, for Blood Red, Snow White.

Writings

Floodland, Orion (London, England), 2000, Delacorte (New York, NY), 2001.

Witch Hill, Delacorte (New York, NY), 2001.

The Dark Horse, Orion (London, England), 2002, Wendy Lamb (New York, NY), 2003.

(Editor) Helen Ward, The Dragon Machine, illustrated by Wayne Anderson, Templar (Dorking, England), 2003.

Cowards, Orion (London, England), 2003.

The Book of Dead Days (also see below), Orion (London, England), 2003, Wendy Lamb (New York, NY), 2004.

A Winter's Tale (picture book), illustrated by Simon Bartram, Templar (London, England), 2003, published as A Christmas Wish, Dutton (New York, NY), 2003.

(Reteller) The Emperor's New Clothes (picture book), illustrated by Alison Jay, Chronicle Books (San Francisco, CA), 2004.

The Dark Flight Down (sequel to The Book of Dead Days), Orion (London, England), 2004, Wendy Lamb Books (New York, NY), 2005.

The Foreshadowing, Orion (London, England), 2005, Wendy Lamb Books (New York, NY), 2006.

My Swordhand Is Singing, Wendy Lamb Books (New York, NY), 2006.

Blood Red, Snow White, Orion (London, England), 2007.

The Kiss of Death, Orion (London, England), 2008.

Flood and Fang ("Raven Mysteries" series), Orion (London, England), 2008.

Contributor to The Restless Dead: Ten Original Stories of the Supernatural, edited by Deborah Noyes, Candlewick Press (Cambridge, MA), 2007. Contributor of book reviews to London Guardian.

ILLUSTRATOR

Nick Riddle, editor, Outremer: Jaufre Rudel and the Countess of Tripoli: A Legend of the Crusades, Fisher King, 1994.

June Counsel, Once upon Our Time, Glyndley Books, 2000.

Sidelights

British author Marcus Sedgwick is well known for the dark themes in his critically acclaimed fantasy novels for young adults, including Witch Hill, The Book of Dead Days, and The Kiss of Death. "I'm famous for

[Image not available for copyright reasons]

being a gloom merchant and for writing dark and serious books (not that I think that they are as dark or as serious as other people seem to …) but I do have a sense of humour," the author stated in a Bookseller interview with Caroline Horn. Sedgwick has written books about a world flooded by global warming, a magician who has made a pact with a demon for his soul, and a girl with magic powers living in an ancient Nordic tribe. He is also the author of several cheerful picture books and has illustrated a collection of myths and a book of folktales for adults.

Although a Horn Book reviewer commented that the story would have benefited from more-developed characters, Sedgwick's "first novel is sufficiently taut, accessible, and swift moving to make it an effective cautionary tale." Lynne T. Burke termed Floodland a "nail-biter" in her review for Reading Today, while Barry Schwartz praised the "gripping ending" in his Book Report review.

Sedgwick followed Floodland with Witch Hill, the tale of a boy named Jamie, whose house is destroyed by fire, and who believes that his baby sister was killed in the flames before he could rescue her. Unable to put his memories of the fire from his mind, Jamie begins dreaming of an evil old witch trying to harm him, and a girl who is the victim of a witch hunt. It seems that the dreams have more meaning than normal nightmares, and that Jamie's dreams are tied into both the history of the town and the series of strange and terrifying events now trouble the village. John Peters, writing in Booklist, warned: "Don't read this suspenseful tale at bedtime."

The Dark Horse borrows its tone from Norse myth. Sigurd's clan is threatened by a group of raiders known only as the Dark Horse. His adopted sister, Mouse, who was raised by animals when she was very young and can still communicate with them, seems to be connected to the Dark Horse in some strange way. Sigurd and Mouse must go together on a quest to retrieve a mysterious box that only one person can open, which they retrieve near a stranger, who at first seems helpful, but later seems to be more dangerous than either of them realize. As Coop Renner wrote in School Library Journal, "Making no concessions to moralizing or romanticizing, Sedgwick's tale is rich, involving, and vivifying."

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Horn Book reviewer Joanna Rudge Long wrote of The Dark Horse that "the bleak setting is fully realized … and the events are gripping."

In The Book of Dead Days Sedgwick returns to the themes of magic and its dangers. Here the magician Valerian and his servant, Boy, seek a way for Valerian to get out of a pact he made with a demon. In a city reminiscent of eighteenth-century Europe, Boy, along with an orphaned girl named Willow, follows Valerian, knowing only that if they do not help him, he will die. The three search for a mysterious book that may help Valerian find a way to avoid his fate. In The Dark Flight Down Boy and Willow are captured by Emperor Frederick, a terrifying man who employs necromancers. Reviewing The Book of Dead Days for Horn Book, Joanna Rudge Long commented that Sedgwick's "dark thriller reaches a satisfactory denouement" leaving readers waiting for answers in the sequel. "Readers who enjoy fast-paced melodrama with an overlay of the supernatural will devour this tale and wait eagerly for the next installment," predicted Bruce Anne Shook in a review for School Library Journal. A contributor to Kirkus Reviews named the first installment a "fascinatingly brooding tale," and Ilene Cooper noted in Booklist, that The Book of Dead Days "is a haunting novel, and the possibility of more is definitely enticing."

Sedgwick returns to a more modern setting with Cowards, a nonfiction work about two young men who refuse to fight during World War I, because they believe that killing is wrong. Labeled by many as cowards, the men are imprisoned, tortured, and eventually killed due to their beliefs. Staying away from the magical elements marking his earlier novels, in Cowards Sedgwick raises modern concerns about the morality of war. "Research is essential in historical writing because the details need to be accurate," the author stated in an online interview on the Children's Literature Comprehensive Database, adding that Cowards "took about nine months of research in the Imperial War Museum as well as background reading and online searching."

Like Cowards, The Foreshadowing is set during World War I. After her older brother is sent into combat, Alexandra "Sasha" Fox, a British teen, begins having frightening visions of her sibling's death. After training as a nurse, she journeys to France, where she hopes to warn her brother and prevent his untimely end. "Sedgwick keeps this story going relentlessly," noted Claire Rosser in Kliatt, citing the novel's "short chapters, haunting images, a courageous heroine, and questions about honor and patriotism that continue to resonate." The author's "fast-paced, minimalist style is well suited to the bleakness of war," observed Horn Book contributor Claire E. Gross, and Gillian Engberg, reviewing The Foreshadowing in Booklist, praised the "unusually powerful, visceral view of war's horrors … in which the real and the supernatural are inextricably linked."

A horror story set in seventeenth-century Europe, My Swordhand Is Singing concerns Peter, a woodcutter, and his violent, hard-drinking father, Tomas. The pair settles in a remote village where it is soon learned that the dead rise from their graves at night to hunt the living. When Peter meets Sofia, a gypsy girl, he learns of his father's mysterious past, and he must then convince Tomas to battle the zombie-like creatures with a powerful sword. My Swordhand Is Singing "is as dark and chilling as a foggy midnight," wrote Ian Chipman in Booklist, and a Publishers Weekly contributor remarked that Sedgwick "knows his way around a gothic setting, and readers will likely devour this bone-chiller." My Swordhand Is Singing received the prestigious Book-trusted Teenage Book Prize.

In The Kiss of Death, a sequel to My Swordhand Is Singing, young Marko travels to Venice to search for his missing father. He meets Sorrel, the daughter of a glassmaker who has gone mad, Sorrel's suspicious neighbor, Venetia, and Peter, now an old man who arrives in the city to vanquish the Shadow Queen. According to London Guardian reviewer Mary Hoffman, Sedgwick "is superb, as in the earlier book about the undead, at creating atmosphere. There it was all snow and ice and shambling zombies; here it is mist, corruption and masks, concealing whether figures in the night are friends or foes." Craig offered praise for the author's distinct narrative, stating that "each chapter is only two or three pages long, and often interspersed with fairytales, letters, diary entries and so on. The effect is not unlike one of those collages, built up by glueing small pieces of torn-up colour magazines to form an image that is both disturbing and suggestive of a bigger picture."

Sedgwick examines the role one man played during the Russian Revolution of 1917 in Blood Red, Snow White, "a magical book that blends bloodthirsty folk tale, rip-roaring adventure, romance and the remarkable true story of one of our favourite children's authors: Arthur Ransome," noted Danuta Kean on the Orion Books Web site. Ransome, who created the popular "Swallows and Amazons" series, traveled to Russia in 1913. There he fell in love with Evgenia Petrovna Shelepina, the secretary of communist revolutionary Leon Trotsky, and also became involved in espionage activities against the Russian czar. "Sedgwick has a faultless ear for the narrative voice of his subject," observed London Times contributor Amanda Craig, "and the real-life story he reveals about spies, adultery, bloodshed and a fortune in gold that follows is irresistible."

Much lighter in tone than his novels, Sedgwick's picture books also involve magical occurrences. A Winter's Tale, published in the United States as A Christmas Wish, tells the story of a boy who lives in a fairly warm climate who wishes for snow for Christmas, so that his home will look like the world in his snow globe. In the night, his wish is granted, and snow surrounds his home, freezing the nearby lake to allow the boy to ice skate. Characters such as gingerbread men, polar bears, dancers, living snowmen, and a snow wizard—presumably the one responsible for the magic—appear to fill the snowy wonderland. "The reader must decide if [the story] is happening outdoors, in the snow globe, or in the boy's imagination," commented a contributor to Kirkus Reviews. Calling the plot fairly thin, Karin Snelson nevertheless admitted in Booklist that any reader who had ever been transfixed by the magic of a snow globe "may be transported by this visual winter fantasy."

In The Emperor's New Clothes, a retelling "true to the spirit of the original" according to Carolyn Phelan in Booklist, Sedgwick brings Hans Christian Andersen's story to readers in the form of rhymed couplets. The traditional tale relates how two swindling tailors, here depicted as weasels, convince an emperor that they have magical cloth which appears to be invisible to the unworthy. The emperor, drawn as a lion in Sedgwick's illustrated retelling, does not wish to seem unworthy, and commissions a robe made of the magical cloth. His advisors (a tortoise and a hare) take turns admiring the imaginary cloth, until a small frog child at the end of the book points out the obvious fact that the emperor is naked. Maria B. Salvadore called Sedgwick's version "a fresh look and sound for an old tale," and a reviewer for Publishers Weekly praised the book as a "buoyant collaboration" between Sedgwick and illustrator Allison Jay.

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Sedgwick lives in Sussex, England, with his daughter, Alice. When he is not writing, he performs as a drummer and actor with the International Band of Mystery, a group that pays tribute to the "Austin Powers" movies. Sedgwick also travels to schools and literary festivals to give workshops on writing. Describing his wishes for his readers, he stated on his home page: "I hope they finish one of my books having been entertained, and maybe moved. I hope that they might remember them for a while, and I hope that they might look at something a bit differently."

Biographical and Critical Sources

PERIODICALS

Booklist, October 1, 2001, John Peters, review of Witch Hill, p. 320; September 15, 2003, Karin Snelson, review of A Christmas Wish, p. 248; September 1, 2004, Ilene Cooper, review of The Book of Dead Days, p. 123; October 1, 2004, Carolyn Phelan, review of The Book of Dead Days, p. 338; June 1, 2005, Ilene Cooper, review of The Dark Flight Down, p. 1792; April 1, 2006, Gillian Engberg, review of The Foreshadowing, p. 43; November 15, 2007, Ian Chipman, review of My Swordhand Is Singing, p. 37.

Book Report, November-December, 2001, Barry Schwartz, review of Floodland, p. 66.

Bookseller, November 21, 2008, Caroline Horn, "A Raven with Something to Crow About," p. 26.

Guardian (London, England), October 11, 2008, Mary Hoffman, review of The Kiss of Death, p. 14.

Horn Book, March, 2001, Joanna Rudge Long, review of Floodland, p. 213; March-April, 2003, Joanna Rudge Long, review of The Dark Horse, p. 217; November-December, 2004, Joanna Rudge Long, review of The Book of Dead Days, p. 718; November-December, 2008, Joanna Rudge Long, review of The Dark Flight Down, p. 725; May-June, 2006, Claire E. Gross, review of The Foreshadowing, p. 330.

Kirkus Reviews, November 1, 2003, review of A Christmas Wish, p. 1320; September 1, 2004, review of The Emperor's New Clothes, p. 874; October 1, 2004, review of The Book of Dead Days, p. 968.

Kliatt, May, 2006, Claire Rosser, review of The Foreshadowing, p. 14; September, 2007, Paula Rohrlick, review of My Swordhand Is Singing, p. 18.

Publishers Weekly, January 29, 2001, review of Floodland, p. 90; September 22, 2003, review of A Christmas Wish, p. 71; September 6, 2004, review of The Emperor's New Clothes, p. 61; November 12, 2007, review of My Swordhand Is Singing, p. 57.

Reading Today, June, 2001, Lynne T. Burke, review of Floodland, p. 32.

School Library Journal, March, 2001, Ellen Fader, review of Floodland, p. 256; September, 2001, Janet Hilburn, review of Witch Hill, p. 232; November, 2001, Lori Craft, review of Floodland, p. 76; March, 2003, Coop Renner, review of The Dark Horse, p. 237; October, 2003, Susan Patron, review of A Christmas Wish, p. 67; October, 2004, Maria B. Salvadore, review of The Emperor's New Clothes, p. 129; November, 2004, Bruce Anne Shook, review of The Book of Dead Days, p. 154; February, 2006, Walter Minkel, review of The Dark Flight Down, p. 136.

Times (London, England), July 21, 2007, Nicolette Jones, review of Blood Red, Snow White, p. 49; August 23, 2008, Amanda Craig, review of The Kiss of Death, p. 15.

ONLINE

Children's Literature Comprehensive Database,http://www.childrenslit.com/ (February 1, 2009), "Q&A with Marcus Sedgwick."

Marcus Sedgwick Home Page,http://www.marcussedgwick.com (February 1, 2009).

Marcus Sedgwick Web log,http://marcussedgwick.blogspot.com/ (February 1, 2009).

Orion Books Web site,http://www.orionbooks.co.uk/ (February 1, 2009), Danuta Kean, interview with Sedgwick.

Random House Web site,http://www.randomhouse.com/ (February 1, 2009), "Marcus Sedgwick."

Something About the Author

Sedgwick, Marcus 1968-

views updated Jun 08 2018

SEDGWICK, Marcus 1968-

Personal

Born 1968, in England; married; children: Alice.

Addresses

Home— Sussex, England. Agent— c/o Author Mail, Orion House, 5 Upper Saint Martin's Lane, London WC2H 9EA, England.

Career

Writer, beginning 1994. Stone carver and wood engraver. Formerly worked as a bookseller, Heffers children's bookshop, Cambridge, England; Ragged Bears children's book publisher, Somerset, England, sales manager; Templar Publishing, Dorking, England, editor; Walker Books, London, England, former sales manager. Performer with International Band of Mystery ("Austin Powers" tribute band and acting troupe), as drummer Basil Exposition.

Awards, Honors

Branford Boase Award, 2000, for Floodland; Edgar Allan Poe nomination, Independent Reading Association award nomination, and Portsmouth Book Award nomination, all 2001, all for Witch Hill; Guardian Children's Fiction Prize shortlist, Carnegie Medal shortlist, and Blue Peter Book Award shortlist, all 2002, all for The Dark Horse; Guardian Book Award nomination, Sheffield Book Award shortlist, and Edgar Allan Poe shortlist, all for The Book of Dead Days.

Writings

Floodland, Orion (London, England), 2000, Delacorte (New York, NY), 2001.

Witch Hill, Delacorte (New York, NY), 2001.

The Dark Horse, Orion (London, England), 2002, Wendy Lamb (New York, NY), 2003.

(Editor) Helen Ward, The Dragon Machine, illustrated by Wayne Anderson, Templar (Dorking, England), 2003.

Cowards, Orion (London, England), 2003.

The Book of Dead Days (also see below), Orion (London, England), 2003, Wendy Lamb (New York, NY) 2004.

A Winter's Tale (picture book), illustrated by Simon Bartram, Templar (London, England), 2003, published as A Christmas Wish, Dutton (New York, NY), 2003.

(Reteller) The Emperor's New Clothes (picture book), illustrated by Alison Jay, Chronicle (San Francisco, CA), 2004.

The Dark Flight Down (sequel to The Book of Dead Days ), Orion (London, England), 2004, Wendy Lamb (New York, NY), 2005.

The Foreshadowing, Orion (London, England), 2005.

ILLUSTRATOR

Nick Riddle, editor, Outremer: Jaufre Rudel and the Countess of Tripoli: A Legend of the Crusades, Fisher King, 1994.

June Counsel, Once upon Our Time, Glyndley Books, 2000.

Sidelights

Though British author Marcus Sedgwick is well known for the dark themes in his fantasy novels for young adults, he assures readers he had a happy childhood. "I was a perfectly normal and happy child," he explained on his Web site. "Honestly. But I slunk into teenage-hood dressed in black, with strange hair-sprayed effects on top. A wonderful world of pretentious but potent dark music was revealed: in short, I became a goth. I know it's not clever now." Still moved by melancholy music and interested in vampires, graveyards, and other dark fantasy themes, Sedgwick has written books about a world flooded by global warming, a magician who has made a pact with a demon for his soul, and a girl with magic powers in an ancient Nordic tribe. He is also the author of several cheerful picture books, and has illustrated a collection of myths and a book of folk tales for adults.

After working as a bookseller and working inside children's publishing, Sedgwick began writing seriously in 1994. His first book, Floodland, was published in 2000 to praise from critics, and it received the Branford-Boase award for the best first children's novel of that year. Floodland tells the story of Zoe, who lives on her own on an island that used to be part of England before global warming caused the seas to rise. Trying to find her family, Zoe leaves her island and lands on the Island of Eels, where there is a power struggle over the limited food and supplies the island has to offer. "Most readers will enjoy this survival story for its heart-pounding plot and dystopic setting," commented Ellen Fader in School Library Journal. Though a Horn Book reviewer commented that the book could have used further developed characters, the reviewer concluded, "this first novel is sufficiently taut, accessible, and swift moving to make it an effective cautionary tale." Lynne T. Burke termed the novel a "nail-biter" in her review for Reading Today, while Barry Schwartz praised the "gripping ending" in his Book Report review.

Sedgwick followed Floodland with Witch Hill, the tale of a boy named Jamie, whose house is destroyed by fire, and who believes that his baby sister was killed in the flames before he could rescue her. Unable to put his memories of the fire from his mind, it fills his dreams; to add to his nightmares, he begins dreaming of an evil old witch trying to harm him, and a girl who is the victim of a witch hunt. It seems that the dreams have more meaning than normal nightmares, and that Jamie's dreams are tied into both the history of the town and a series of strange and terrifying events now troubling the village. John Peters, writing in Booklist, warned, "Don't read this suspenseful tale at bedtime."

The Dark Horse borrows its tone from Norse myth. Sigurd's clan is threatened by a group of raiders known only as the Dark Horse. His adopted sister, Mouse, who was raised by animals when she was very young and can still communicate with them, seems to be connected to the Dark Horse in some strange way. Sigurd and Mouse must go together on a quest to retrieve a mysterious box that only one person can open, which they retrieve near a stranger, who at first seems helpful, but later seems to be more dangerous than either of them realize. Coop Rennet in School Library Journal commented, "Making no concessions to moralizing or romanticizing, Sedgwick's tale is rich, involving, and vivifying." Horn Book reviewer Joanna Rudge Long praised, "the bleak setting is fully realized … and the events are gripping."

Sedgwick returned to a more modern setting with Cowards, a novel of two young men who refuse to fight during World War I, because they believe killing is wrong. Labeled by many as cowards, the pair are imprisoned, tortured, and eventually killed due to their beliefs. Staying away from the magical elements marking his earlier novels, Sedgwick infuses the novel with historical possibilities and raises modern concerns about the morality of war.

Sedgwick's next pair of novels return to the themes of magic and its dangers as the magician Valerian and his servant, Boy, seek a way for Valerian to get out of a pact he made with a demon. Set in a city reminiscent of eighteenth-century Europe, The Book of Dead Days, tells the story of how Boy, along with an orphaned girl named Willow, follow Valerian through the City without understanding his motivation—they only know that if they don't help him, he will die, which would leave them out in the cold. The three search for a mysterious book that may help Valerian find a way to avoid his fate. Leaving much unanswered, the book paves the way directly to its sequel, The Dark Flight Down, during which Boy and Willow are captured by Emperor Frederick, a terrifying man who employs necromancers. Reviewing the first novel in Horn Book, Joanna Rudge Long commented that the "dark thriller reaches a satisfactory denouement" leaving readers waiting for answers in the sequel. "Readers who enjoy fast-paced melodrama with an overlay of the supernatural will devour this tale and wait eagerly for the next installment," noted Bruce Anne Shook in a review for School Library Journal. A contributor to Kirkus Reviews named the first installment a "fascinatingly brooding tale," and Ilene Cooper, writing in Booklist, noted, "This is a haunting novel, and the possibility of more is definitely enticing."

Though much lighter in tone than his novels, Sedgwick's picture books also involve magical occurrences.A Winter's Tale, published in the United States as A Christmas Wish, tells the story of a boy who lives in a fairly warm climate who wishes for snow for Christmas, so that his home will look like the world in his snow globe. In the night, his wish is granted, and snow surrounds his home, freezing the nearby lake to allow the boy to ice skate. Characters such as gingerbread men, polar bears, dancers, living snowmen, and a snow wizard—presumably the one responsible for the magic—appear to fill the snowy wonderland. "The reader must decide if [the story] is happening outdoors, in the snow globe, or in the boy's imagination," commented a contributor to Kirkus Reviews. Feeling that the plot was fairly thin, Karin Snelson of Booklist nevertheless admitted that any reader who had ever been transfixed by the magic of a snowglobe "may be transported by this visual winter fantasy."

In a retelling "true to the spirit of the original" according to Carolyn Phelan of Booklist, Sedgwick brings Hans Christian Andersen's story of "The Emperor's New Clothes" to readers in the form of rhymed couplets. The traditional tale relates how two swindling tailors, here depicted as weasels, convince an emperor that they have magical cloth which appears to be invisible to the unworthy. The emperor, drawn as a lion in Sedgwick's retelling, does not wish to seem unworthy, and commissions a robe made of the magical cloth. His advisors (a tortoise and a hare) take turns admiring the imaginary cloth, until a small frog child at the end of the book points out the obvious fact that the emperor is naked. Maria B. Salvadore called Sedgwick's version "a fresh look and sound for an old tale," and a reviewer for Publishers Weekly praised the book as a "buoyant collaboration" between Sedgwick and illustrator Allison Jay.

Sedgwick lives in Sussex, England, with his young daughter, Alice. When he is not writing, he performs as a drummer and actor with the International Band of Mystery, a group that pays tribute to the "Austin Powers" movies. Sedgwick also to schools and literary festivals to give workshops on writing.

Biographical and Critical Sources

PERIODICALS

Book Report, November-December, 2001, Barry Schwartz, review of Floodland, p. 66; May 16, 2003, "Walker Books," p. 12.

Bookseller, July 13, 2001, "Award for Editor Turned Novelist," p. 38; May 2, 2003, "Shortlist Hat-Trick for Sedgwick," p. 6.

Publishers Weekly, January 29, 2001, review of Floodland, p. 90; September 22, 2003, review of A Christmas Wish, p. 71; September 6, 2004, review of The Emperor's New Clothes, p. 61.

Reading Today, June, 2001, Lynne T. Burke, review of Floodland, p. 32.

School Library Journal, March, 2001, Ellen Fader, review of Floodland, p. 256; September, 2001, Janet Hilburn, review of Witch Hill, p. 232; November, 2001, Lori Craft, review of Floodland, p. 76; March, 2003, Coop Renner, review of The Dark Horse, p. 237; October, 2003, Susan Patron, review of A Christmas Wish, p. 67; April, 2004, review of The Dark Horse, p. S48; October, 2004, Maria B. Salvadore, review of The Emperor's New Clothes, p. 129; November, 2004, Bruce Anne Shook, review of The Book of Dead Days, p. 154.