Undone!: More Mad Endings - Hardcover

Grade 5-8?Eight more stories from the Australian author of Unmentionable! (Viking, 1993) and similar collections that offer readers opportunities to chuckle, shiver, and grimace in disgust. As usual, the grosser incidents are the most memorable: in the first selection, a camper befriends a wild boy who wears a suit of live bats; in another, the granola-and-cod-liver-oil mixture that Anthony refuses to swallow germinates in his mouth and becomes "Noseweed"; and the final tale, "You Be the Judge," begins, "A person who eats someone else is called a cannibal. But what are you called if you drink someone? Like I did." Jennings's sympathies are always with the underdog, and here several bullies get imaginatively just deserts. The author also prizes mental toughness; in "Wake Up to Yourself," Simon rejects a happy but imaginary family to help his real mother give birth, and to Sally's amusement the boys who jeer at her femininity in "What a Woman" faint dead away when she brings her aunt's toe to school. The stories end with neat twists or telling questions that are more thoughtful than "mad." The book will be equally appealing to less-practiced readers, scary-story fans, or adults hunting for surefire read-alouds.?John Peters, New York Public Library
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Gr. 5-8. In his latest collection, Australian writer Jennings once again manages to step into fantastical realms without ever losing touch with firm ground. Of the eight stories here, several integrate elements of the traditional horror tale. In "Clear as Mud," for example, a bully finds himself the shunned outsider when the bite of a beetle turns his skin transparent. Though much more realistic, "What a Woman"--in which the boys who taunt a girl athlete receive their comeuppance--also contains a tiny, horrific shock. Sometimes clever, sometimes dark, and often quirky, the roundup offers good variety and lots of surprises, and like Jennings' previous anthologies of weird tales, it's a good change of pace, full of imagination. Stephanie Zvirin