Book Review: Tales from the Hood
Sunday, May 3, 2009 at 2:30PM 
The Sisters Grimm Book 6: Tales From the Hood by Michael Buckley
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
The Sisters Grimm saga continues to delight in the sixth book, Tales from the Hood. Sabrina and Daphne finally uncover the truth about Mr. Canis (and the real story of Little Red Riding Hood) as he undergoes a farce of a trial for his past crimes. While a courtroom drama was not what I was expecting from this book, it’s neat to see the classic fairy tale vetted like an episode of “Law and Order.” The result is a fairly unique adaptation of the story, and the evil characters on the prosecution (Blackbeard and the Sheriff of Nottingham, with the Mad Hatter presiding as judge) add enough malice and insanity to keep things interesting.
Of course, you can’t have a Sisters Grimm novel without some kind of exciting adventure. With the aid of magic, the girls travel with their Uncle Jake across Europe to find Goldilocks, the one person who might be able to break the sleeping spell over their parents. The chase scenes in Venice and Paris are fun, and the standoff with an agent of the Scarlet Hand is especially good, even if they do read a little too much like episodes of television. It does make sense to me when I consider Buckley’s background in that genre.
I found some of the most interesting scenes in this book were the ones showing Sabrina, the elder of the Grimm duo, riding the puberty roller coaster. Her makeup disasters and little girl crushes are very cute, and I almost wish the author would’ve explored this a bit more, or at least given it the same amount of deliberate care as Daphne’s adorable attempts to act more grown up herself. I also think those were missed opportunities to more fully illustrate the painful absence of the girls’ mother (even though she’s sleeping in the next room) during a time when little girls really need a mother’s insight.
All this and more is a nice lead-in to the forthcoming seventh book in the series, The Everafter War. After all this time, it’s sure to have a great pay-off! I’d like to take this opportunity to remind everyone to support their local independent bookstores. I, for one, will be making a special visit to The Valley Bookseller when The Everafter War is released this week. I can hardly wait!
Reader Comments (3)
My husband had read all the books, so I hope to, too, when I have free time again. Do you still want to read the Twilight series? I have them all if you'd like to borrow them!
I haven't heard of this series. It sounds fascinating. At the moment, I'm reading The Book of Lost Things by John Connolly. The Sisters Grim series reminds me of the book I'm reading in that they both seem to be a bit weird and involve tales we grew up on.
Helen
http://straightfromhel.blogspot.com
Thanks for stopping by. Yeah I did see that they were making a movie of P & P & Z.