Reviews for Reactions of coordinated ligands

The average rating for Reactions of coordinated ligands based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2013-06-06 00:00:00 Shax Webb Hilary McKay is probably my favorite living not-edited-by-me children's book author. Stylistically, she barrels right through much of what I think of as the rules of good storytelling, but she does it with such confidence and such unique payoffs that it leaves me questioning the rules and not *her*. If she wrote for adults, she'd be acclaimed as a comic genius and showered with prizes; as it is, I'm torn between trying to share her books with other people and keeping their pleasures for myself. She is definitely not for every taste, but if you like Jane Austen, Elinor Lipman, Natalie Standiford, or the Penderwicks novels -- books that treasure domestic life and character, and are funny and beautifully written to boot -- do give her a try. (Also, I think, if you're a fan of Megan Whalen Turner, because while their subject matter is very different, Hilary McKay is a maestro on the order of MWT in terms of authorial control, of every word being used just right, not one wasted, information doled out on HER terms and no one else's.) DOLPHIN LUCK, like all her middle-grade novels, has the children of a large family (two large families here) getting into trouble simply by being themselves, as their equally quirky parents struggle to maintain order and/or sanity -- and somehow it all comes together to be both hilarious and moving. It didn't quite reach the glories of the third-person Casson novels for me, though -- I think in part because it's a sequel, and I haven't read the first book (or the one that follows) as yet. If this review intrigues you into reading Ms. McKay's work, I recommend starting with SAFFY'S ANGEL or, if you love A LITTLE PRINCESS as I do (and she does), her lovely sequel to that book, called WISHING FOR TOMORROW.

Review # 2 was written on 2008-08-12 00:00:00 Lori Zennario I really, really loved this, mainly because it is HILARIOUS. It was wholly far-out--McKay's earlier books make more obvious use of kind of unbelievable coincidences and the supernatural, but they are just so in the tradition of "family adventure story" that I don't really mind. As with many books set/written just ten years prior to the present day, their timelessness is marred by the lack of mobile phones! Because so much of the playing out of the plot relies here on the fact that the kids end up out of communication, and have to trek back and forth to a phone box in the snow. (On second thought, it DOES take place on the North Yorkshire coast, where there is no phone coverage ANYWHERE.) There, that was a useless review that gives nothing away. It's not McKay's best book, it's not her best series, but it's still a cracking good story. Go read it. You'll laugh your head off and it won't be time wasted. This is the first of her early books in which I can kind of see McKay gearing up to move on to the Exiles series. She is really the only contemporary author that I wish I could write like.