Compass South
A Graphic Novel (Four Points, Book 1)
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- $16.99
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
Get ready for a thrilling journey in Compass South, a New York Times–bestselling middle-grade graphic novel full of pirates and adventure, from the same team who created the Eisner Award-winner Salt Magic.
It's 1860 in New York City. When 12-year-old twins Alexander and Cleopatra's father disappears, they join the Black Hook Gang and are caught by the police pulling off a heist. They agree to reveal the identity of the gang in exchange for tickets to New Orleans. But once there, Alex is shanghaied to work on a ship that is heading for San Francisco via Cape Horn. Cleo stows away on a steamer to New Granada where she hopes to catch a train to San Francisco to find her brother. Neither Alexander nor Cleo realizes the real danger they are in-they are being followed by pirates who think they hold the key to treasure. How they outwit the pirates and find each other makes for a fast-paced, breathtaking adventure.
A Margaret Ferguson Book
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Hot-tempered Alex and thoughtful Cleo are pretty sure that their father is dead. Armed only with the watch and knife he left them, the Dodge twins are on their own in an antebellum world of crime and double-dealing. If they can get to San Francisco, they plan to pass as a pair of lost redheaded twins for whom a reward has been offered. To their astonishment, they meet Silas and Edwin, an older set of redheaded twins doing the same thing. ("We expected to meet all kinds of people," Cleo tells them, "but never ourselves.") Separated, Alex and Edwin round Cape Horn on a ship, while Cleo and Silas travel through Panama. Larson's (Who Is AC?) concoction of tried-and-true adventure elements stowaways, pirate raids, jungle tribes hangs together convincingly, and scene-stealers such as Tarboro, a free black man who's a brilliant swordsman and the story's true hero, provide moral ballast. Illustrator Mock, making her debut, adeptly captures the changing relationships between the twins especially the gender-bending awkwardness that accompanies Cleo's stint as a boy. A sequel is promised (so the knife and watch can reveal their secrets). Ages 10 12.
