ROAD READS
Road Reads
"The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear," by Walter Moers
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BOOK: "The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear," by Walter Moers (Overlook Press, $26.95)
TARGET AUDIENCE: Bright preteens and others who believe that the best travel is filled with adventure, slimy creatures and disgusting smells.
In a fictional travelogue that is equal parts J.K. Rowling, Douglas Adams and Shel Silverstein, Bluebear journeys to a gourmet island where pools of naturally heated cooking oil are surrounded by potato fritter plants (it's a trap, of course), an inescapable city built inside an enormous tornado, the inside of a giant's brain, and Atlantis. He also serves as navigator for a nearsighted pterodactyl.
Moers has an inexhaustible supply of horrific creatures and cliffhanger plots. How will Bluebear escape this time? It seems there is always a deus ex machina (indeed, one of his rescuers is named "Deus X. Machina"). At 700-plus pages, this is a work of monumental silliness, but between the pools of earwax and trails of slime are truths about trust, friendship and the joyous exploration of the unknown.
-- Jerry V. Haines
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