Sound Bender

October 1, 2011
A young adolescent boy discovers secret, amazing powers. Thirteen-year-old Leo Lomax and his brother Hollis have barely had time to absorb the fact that their parents have been lost in a plane crash when they are swept away from the only home they've ever known. Their step-uncle Crane installs them in his combination resident/warehouse in a bleak area of Brooklyn. The warehouse is chock full of what Uncle Crane considers valuable antiquities and artifacts, but Leo finds one that can't be either: a helmet that looks--and more importantly sounds--both painful and dangerous. Leo discovers that he is, in fact, a Sound Bender, someone who can actually hear the past just by touching an object. This leads him and his best friend Trevor on a quest halfway around the world to stop Crane from selling the helmet to the Russians and to free whoever has been trapped by this dastardly device. Although it has an interesting coming-of-age premise, this book is often confusing, with too many undeveloped threads and promising characters who rarely come to life. Leo's first-person narration too often tells instead of shows ("It wasn't surprising with everything that I'd been through lately, but I couldn't believe I forgot my own birthday"), which contributes to the overall flatness of the story. Ultimately, readers will feel this has all been done before. (Science fiction. 10-14)

(COPYRIGHT (2011) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

January 1, 2012

Gr 4-7-After Leo Lomax's parents die in a plane crash in Antarctica, he is sent to live with a rich and peculiar stepuncle in Brooklyn. Not long after his arrival, Leo turns 13 and receives a mysterious package from his deceased father detailing his origins. He was born not in Manhattan but on an island of undiscovered people who communicated through song near Papua New Guinea. The village holy man named him Sound Bender. After this mysterious note, he discovers that when touching emotionally charged objects, he can hear the memories embedded in them. Leo's uncle deals in priceless artifacts, and when the boy discovers what looks like a horrific torture device, he is given a painful vision and knows he must discover how to right a wrong. Sound Bender is based on an interesting premise, but falls short in its execution. The pacing is askew, and early on a lot of time is spent on character development and backstory, leaving the quest and adventure part feeling rushed and unsatisfying. A number of the characters working for Leo's uncle are obviously of Russian or Eastern European descent, and the Cold War-esque portrayal of them could be read as culturally insensitive. Nevertheless, Baker's writing style is extremely approachable and readable.-Devin Burritt, Jackson Memorial Library, Tenants Harbor, ME

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