Reviews

Gr 5-7‘This story of a troubled child is set in the real world of Wales, yet it incorporates strong elements of fantasy. Dinah, 11, is bright and self-sufficient but has a young, single, and somewhat immature mother. Ever since the child can remember, they have moved from one makeshift living arrangement to another, till Dinah's greatest desire is to have a stable home for the two of them. When the mother's new, wealthy boyfriend moves them into his huge dilapidated old mansion, Dinah determines to make her wish come true. That wish becomes desperate as the girl is left alone more and more by a Mum increasingly preoccupied with her boyfriend‘a man who heartily dislikes Dinah. She finds a solution when she happens into a fantasy world in which the stone figures of wild animals, carved in bas-relief on an old castle wall, come alive at night. She summons them to patrol the garden of the old mansion and protect it from demolition. At first they serve her, but as her anxiety about her future mounts, they turn on her and bring her to the edge of disaster. Dinah is a strong, likable character, as are the two boys in her class who befriend her. However, several of the plot elements are muddled or unexplained, and the fairy-talelike ending is so contrived that it diminishes the story.‘Virginia Golodetz, St. Michael's College, Winooski, VT