The Civil War is waging in the south, in 1863, but this is New York City. Here is a story told from a person of color’s perspective. Here “some of the people, places, and events are based on real historical facts, some are inspired by real historical facts, and some are just totally made up.” (242) The biggest ‘made up‘ piece is the domesticated dinosaurs, used in place of horses, carrier pigeons, and airplanes. The Colored Orphan Asylum, Vigilance Committee, and “Richard Riker was a real-life magistrate in the New York City courts, and he did indeed run an organization called the Kidnapping Club that captured black New Yorkers and sent them into slavery…” (244) make this an eye opener for this reader.

New York men are now being drafted to fight in the Civil War. Richard Riker and his followers use this as a excuse to set an area in New York City were blacks live ablaze. Riots ensue. The Colored Orphan Asylum is burnt. Riker captures the orphans and plans to ship them down south into slavery. A few orphans were at the Zanzibar Theater watching an all-black Shakespearean company when the theater caught fire. These orphans escape with the help of the two black actors. They escape the fire and the riots. The stage is now set for the thrilling story of the fiery orphan Magdalys’ rise to a leadership role in recovering the captured orphans from Riker.

Slowly Magdalys realizes she can communicate with dinosaurs and get them to follow her instructions. Magdalys’ knew ability helps when the orphans need to ride a sauropod ferry across the river to Brooklyn. It helps when she flies on the back of a dactyl to Manhattan (dactyls are not dinosaurs- a character informs) and when triceratopses are needed in the final battle charge to release the orphans.

The dinosaurs do not detract from the historical events and issues of this period in time. This is a fun ride, so get ready to fly into the action.

Book #2 in the Mrs. Smith’s Spy School for Girls series takes off a year after the first book. Abby is now in her second year at The Smith School for Children, a private boarding school. It is also a “training facility for the Center, a government organization that uses kids to ferret out information no one else has any hope of acquiring. The theory is that kids are invisible…and therefore make really good spies.”(8) A few things have changed. The first and foremost for Abby being the interim Headmaster is her own mother. A new Headmaster means changes will be made. One change is the rule dealing with no playing of the video game Monster Mayhem. (Monster Mayhem is very much like Pokemon Go.) So, of course, Abby is playing it on the sly.

At this day’s Morning Meeting, the guest speaker in Toby’s father -Drexel Cain, the inventor of Monster Mayhem. At the end of the meeting, a smokey explosion has the entire school evacuating the auditorium. A short time later, Toby is sent a ransom note, via text message, for his father. Toby must play and win the latest version of Monster Mayhem, which has not been made available to the public yet, to get his father back. As always, Toby is not to tell anyone about the kidnapping. And as always, people, especially Abby, find out and try to help.

Off the reader goes to see if the kidnapper will be caught by extremely smart, extremely rich, extremely well-connected middle-school students who are secretly training to be spies while figuring out clues to the video game Monster Mayhem which takes them around the world. Yes, they are scared at times, but Abby’s mother used to say,”that being afraid was good because fear let you know when you should be alert and aware. She said it was the body’s way of turning on all the lights and getting ready.” (249)

So get ready readers, the Power Play is is about to begin!

Typo on page 198, paragraph 9, “It” should be ‘If’.