Shelly's Book Blog

Ellen Potter's Olivia Kidney is a fantasy filled with odd but wonderful characters. Reading this book, I was reminded of the Series of Unfortunate Events books, because Olivia meets many strange characters. It is also quite scary at times. For example, she faces the evil pirate Master Clive, a man known to enjoy torturing and murdering people. " 'If your daddy is lying, my sweet, I will slice off all your fingers and toes and feed them to the gulls,'" he tells one little girl in the story. Despite the cartoonish illustrations on the cover, then, this story is probably not meant for really young kids.
Olivia's dad works as a superintendent in a big apartment building, but he is not very good at his job and has been fired many times. This means, of course, that Olivia and her dad have moved often. Although being the new kid has become routine for her, it has not become any easier with practice, and Olivia is lonely. Over the course of this story, however, she discovers that she has an unusual talent that helps to alleviate some of her misery. This book is the first in a series, so I will looke forward to reading more about Olivia and her weirdly wonderful world.