Wednesday, February 3, 2016

Eye of the Drone by Rebecca Merry Murdock


Rating: WARTY!

I've had mixed results with this author and this is the second of three novels with which I was not very impressed. I didn't like Rocco's Wings (note that this isn't a part of this series), which I reviewed in March of 2015. I did like the first volume in the Wild Cats series, which I also reviewed in March of 2015.

This is the second volume of the series, and is also an advance review copy for which I was grateful for the opportunity to take a look at, but which for me fell short of the glory of its predecessor. I applaud the idea behind this series, which is to educate young readers of the plight of wild cats, many of which are facing extinction, and I do appreciate that a good way to approach this is to tell an adventure story, in this case, one in which two young people get out and explore. For me though, this one took completely the wrong approach and let a serious and important topic devolve into complete fantasy. The wild cats which it was supposed to be about became pretty much an unimportant footnote or afterthought to the children's ever more implausible adventures, which included an encounter with a magical fairy who was disguised as a butterfly! It was too much for me and I think it sent this series along an unfortunately frivolous road from which it won't be able to return. The wild cats deserved better. I cannot in good faith recommend this volume.