My Near-Death Adventures

April 1, 2016
A move from lumber camp into town only adds new hazards to older ones for a loose-lipped young, white Michigander and his recently divorced mom. As in My Near-Death Adventures (99% True!) (2015), DeCamp tells two stories simultaneously--because, as one of the most clueless narrators ever, 11-year-old Stanley Slater constructs a personal reality at odds with what's actually going on around him. On the one hand, he's absorbed with the trials of keeping a laid-up neighbor's motor-mouthed 7-year-old son alive and reasonably clean, defending himself from his scary cousin Geri and schoolmate Mad Madge, and preventing his mother from marrying rich but hateful suitor Archibald Crutchley. And then there's his long-absent, thoroughly idealized father. Beneath these surface events, though, are telling glimpses of more complex doings: his mom is pulled between the safety marriage to Crutchley would bring and her love for steady-minded lumberjack Stinky Pete; Geri barely pulls through a serious illness; and Stan's dad turns out to be a charming but thoroughly rotten egg. Stan's utter inability to keep from blurting out his frank opinions was funny in the previous episode but seems overused here. Still, it makes for plenty of comical exchanges, and along with adding historical atmosphere, the sheaves of actual 19th-century advertisements and photos he collects and annotates further lighten the tone. A high-energy romp, occasionally a bit labored but still chock-full of hilarity. (Historical fiction. 10-12)

COPYRIGHT(2016) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

May 1, 2016

Gr 4-6-The year is still 1895 in Michigan's Upper Peninsula, but in DeCamp's follow-up to the "near-death" adventures of the imaginative and spirited hero Stanley Slater, Stan has moved with his mother from a logging camp to a boardinghouse. Stan continues to attract trouble like a magnet-much of it caused by his habit of unconsciously voicing thoughts that would be better left unsaid. As he was in the first novel, Stan is motivated by a powerful urge to connect with his long-lost father and an equally strong interest in preventing his hard-working mother from marrying the wrong man. To help make ends meet, Stanley spends his after-school hours taking care of Cuddy Carlisle, a lovable seven-year-old boy. The scenes featuring the two boys are humorous and warm, conveying that, above all, Stan is a generous and good-hearted kid. While he continues to dream up preposterous money-making schemes (one of which involves actual snake oil), Stan always keeps an eye open for his long-lost father. When a ship comes into town, aptly called the Wanderer, Stan learns that his dad is the captain, but it doesn't take long for him to learn the hard truth about Cap'n Slater: "They move away from him as if he's Moses and they are the Red Sea," he observes about the ship's crew. Enter Stinky Pete, a kind and reliable man from the logging camp. Stanley adores him, and it soon becomes clear that his mother does, too. Like the first volume, this entry features vintage photos and ads from Stan's beloved scrapbook, which contribute to the book's charm.

Copyright 2016 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.