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Which Way to Witch School?

by Scott Santoro
32p. 978-0-06078-181-1.
COPY ISBN
K-Gr 2—In rhyming couplets, Santoro presents Miss Thornapple's School for Witches. The girls are seen as they prepare for the journey ("Packing is simple,/it's done just like that./The trick is to get all your things in your hat"), travel by flying bus, and then engage in such activities as dining on eyeballs and tentacles, being able to swim in a swamp, and learning the physics behind flying broomsticks. The rhymes often seem forced ("Miss Zorch is their teacher in chemistry class,/which for a witch is important to pass"), making this an awkward read-aloud. Santoro's background as an animator is evident in both the perspectives and in the rather flat quality of the art, which resembles still shots from cartoons. Better stories about witches and about school abound.—Grace Oliff, Ann Blanche Smith School, Hillsdale, NJ
Miss Thornapple's School for Witches teaches everything that good witches need to know, from the physics of a broom in flight to the chemistry of potions. Some of the story's elements are overly familiar (e.g., traveling to school on a flying bus), and the text's couplets include a few awkward rhymes. Retro cartoonlike illustrations are sometimes effective, sometimes garish.
Reviewed by Grace Oliff , Aug 01, 2010

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