I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: OZOKIDZ-“Germs” (2013).

This song is also on the WXPN Kids Corner CD.  Ozokidz is related to the band Ozomatli, who I don’t know all that much about.

The music in this song is very upbeat reggae with the main melody done on kazoos (I suspect this is all one person, but i don’t know for sure).  There’s also some kids’ instruments playing along.  The beat is fast enough that I might consider this ska.

This song is a lesson about germs.  It begins by telling us how to prevent germs from causing us trouble (washing your hands, mostly).  The second half talks about how some germs—some bacteria—are good for us (bacteria is rhymed with healing ya).  But certainly the most memorable part of the song is when he rhymes food with poo (and the song stops so a tiny voice can say “ew, he said poo”).

The message is a good one, and the delivery method is more fun than anything else.  Although it seems a little half-baked of an idea to me.

[READ: August and September 2013] The Underworlds series

I was delighted when I saw that Tony Abbott had a new series and I couldn’t wait to start reading it to the kids.  T. has been asking me to read the Droon series to her like I did for C.  But it is such a long series that I was happy to find something shorter to start with.  It turns out that this Underworlds series is aimed a little older than Droon.  It gets pretty dark, and I was a little worried about some of the concepts in it (the Underworlds are the realm of death after all–and hmm, she has been talking a lot about death lately…).  But in pure Tony Abbott fashion, this was an exciting series where nothing less than the fate of the world is at stake.  And there’s humor as well (although somewhat less than in his other series).  But what really sold me on this series was the way he uses classical mythology (accurately) to generate the basis and conflict of this story.

And even better than using these mythologies, Abbot merges them so that the different cultural underworlds run into each other and even join forces.  It is a great way to learn some mythology if you don’t know it (there are handy maps of the Underworlds) or to gain a more in-depth understanding of the mythologies.  By the end of the series, the kids will have encountered the Greek, Norse, Egyptian and Babylonian gods of the Underworld as well as some of the major scary guys that come out of the Underworld.

Book #1 The Battle Begins starts the series. Owen Brown is in the fourth grade.  He’s having a weird day at school, but he’s excited because his friend Dana Runson is going to be staying at his house while her parents are away in Iceland on an expedition.  But just as he sees her in the hallway, the floor opens up and swallow her.  Obviously, he’s going crazy. That could never have happened.  But where could Dana have gone?

It turns out that Sydney Lamberti, the new shop teacher’s daughter witnessed this hole opening up as well.  She confirms that Owen isn’t crazy.  She even saw a glowing monster down there.  And so they decide to do something about it.  They enlist the help of Dana’s and Owen’s friend, Jon Doyle (who is basically the comic relief), and set out to figure out what just happened.

They travel to Dana’s house where they see all of the books and traveling equipment that the Runson’s have in their library.  While they are there, they discover a book in which Dana collected all kinds of information about ancient mythology.  And while they are there, they are attacked by a giant fire-breathing wolf (who turns out to be Fenrir, a Norse myth).

The kids quickly decipher that Loki, the Norse trickster god has taken Dana.  And the kids also quickly learn (from their three lunch ladies, who are actually Valkyries–I loved that touch), that the entrance to one of the Underworlds is in their school.  They also learn that the one thing that they can use to help them on their travels is the lyre of Orpheus.  Orpheus was the only man who was able to travel to the (Greek) land of the dead to retrieve his wife and to return alive.  And his lyre just happens to be in the museum in town.  They are able to grab the lyre (in a very funny scene) and Owen is able to “play” it to create magical occurrences.

Soon enough, the kids are traveling into the Greek Underworld.  They meet Charon who takes them across the River Styx where they meet Hades.  He is none too pleased to see the kids in his domain, but he is also fearful of what Loki must be planning.  And he sets a task for the children.

It is a tough challenge and a frightening one, but the children work together to solve it.  By the end f the story, Dana is returned, by the scope of their adventure has only just begun, and they promise Hades that they will continue to fight Loki and his evil plan.

Book #2 is called When Monster Escape.  This book starts three days after the kids rescued Dana.  But in those three days some shocking things have happened.  Like the giant Cyclopses that have taken over their town of Pinewood Bluffs.  The monsters are using the energy from the town’s power plants to generate power for Loki.

We learn that Loki plans to wage war with Odin.  And while that may sound like it is just a matter for the Norse Underworld, if Loki takes over the Norse Underworld, he likely won’t just stop there.

During their battles, Dana is able to steal one of Loki’s gloves which has very powerful magic (and which keeps some of Loki’s power at bay).  So now with Orpheus’ Lyre they have two magical items.

This book is vastly different in feel (but not tone) from the first because the Norse Underworld is very different from the Greek one.  Things are much colder here.  And when the children visit Asgard, it is quite a thrill (we had just watched the first Percy Jackson film, so the kids were familiar with Asgard–and yes there are some similarities with the series, but really it’s mostly the mythology aspect that is the same).  The kids also get to meet Odin as well.

The stakes grow higher with each book and we enjoyed every page of it.

Book #3 is Revenge of the Scorpion King.  In this book, the kids travel to the Babylonian Underworld and the Egyptian Underworld.  While I know Greek and Norse mythology fairly well, Babylonian was new to me and I enjoyed learning a lot about this region.  They get there by hiding in Loki’s sledge.

The Babylonian Underworld is a kind of desert wasteland (where fireballs turn the sand into glass.  Indeed when the book opens they are being tracked by a giant serpent.  But that is nothing compared to the Scorpion King.  The Scorpion King was once Kingdu who attacked Marduk (king of the Babylonian Underworld) and was turned into the giant scorpion.  And he is the key to Loki retrieving what he needs to complete his mission–dominance of the Underworld and Midgard (the human world).  And Loki has already sent fire monsters to destroy Pinewood Bluffs.

The triumphant final sequence (that goes on for many chapters is the Babylonian tower where the kids must defeat the Seven Monsters of Babylon–Mammoth, Thornviper, Furnace, Mad Dog, Fire Serpent, Bird Man and Ullikummi.  Each level requires a different strategy and it is great to see the kids work together (with the help of some magic) to conquer each level.

Book # 4 The Ice Dragon concludes the series in very dramatic fashion.  because now Dana’s parents are also missing–captured and held somewhere in the wilds of the Icelandic Underworld.  So it’s fortunate that the kids were given magical horses (from the Valkyries) and are now flying hundreds of miles an hour across the frozen skies of Iceland.

They also need to stop Loki from finding the Crystal Rune which will allow him to complete his diabolical plan.  Which is of course, causing Ragnarok, the Twilight of the Gods, Loki’s overthrow of Odin himself.  For it is Odin who once hid the Crystal Rune, which grants the power of his throne.  If Loki finds it….

And so we move into the home of the Norse gods for the final battle at the throne of Odin.

This series was very exciting.  The kids both enjoyed it a lot (although they wished there were more pictures).  And I was really delighted at what great retention of the series they had (like they remembered how many strings Orpheus’ lyre had after we had put the book down for a couple of days–that’s a plot point, not a random quiz). Tony Abbott is a wonderful writer, and we are big fans of every series he’s done so far.

I see that he has a new series, The Copernicus Legacy, coming out next year.  We’ll certainly be waiting for it.