2024-01-05
An incident over summer break saddles a Colorado sixth grader with an apparent curse in this debut, which was originally published as a Kickstarter project in 2021.
Life sometimes throws curveballs, or so Matt’s dad says, but this one’s a doozy. Right after pulling a pretend (but all-too-effective) karate move on his neighbor Jenna and breaking her collarbone, a long series of odd accidents chronically leave Matt with one or more broken toes. This not only earns him unwanted notoriety in middle school as the latest kid to catch the legendary Curse but also threatens his place on the traveling soccer team. Eicheldinger tucks in daffy cartoon spot art, kits his protagonist out with an exaggeratedly aggressive but steadfastly loyal fake girlfriend, and works hard to make this a lightweight tale about overcoming physical pain and solving problems with the help of pals, but the tale contains some questionable elements. Notably, there’s an episode in which Matt and his best friend flood the bedroom of a bully who’s repeated third grade three times. Two older adult characters are presented as figures for mockery: a soccer coach who reads as alcoholic (although this is not acknowledged) and a substitute teacher who’s first introduced as spitting at Matt’s car while behaving erratically in the street. Notwithstanding happy endings both on and off the soccer field, such sour notes may leave readers with mixed reactions. The cast is cued white.
Mildly entertaining. (Fiction. 10-13)
