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Type of bind: Paperback
EAN num: 9780810993235
ISBN number: 0810993236
Label: Amulet
Manufacturer: Amulet
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 320
Printing Date: April 01, 2007
Publishing house: Amulet
Age index: Ages 4-8
Sale Popularity Level: 6446
Studio: Amulet
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Product Description:
In book two of the series, the Sisters Grimm start school at Ferryport Landing Elementary. Daphne’s lucky enough to get Snow White for a teacher—she loves little people—but poor Sabrina’s stuck with Mr. Grumpner and a class of mildly psychotic sixth graders. When Mr. Grumpner is found hanging in a spider’s web, it is up to the Grimms to find the Everafter who did it. If only Sabrina can get over her distrust of all fairy-tale folk. But how can she trust those who just might be responsible for the disappearance of her parents?
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Rated by buyers 
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I received the very first two books in Michael Buckley's Sisters Grimm books as a gift. The premise of the series sounded incredibly promising and exactly like the kind of thing I would love. Even the covers are great. Unfortunately, I was not as impressed by the very first book, The Fairy Tale Detectives, as I had hoped. Still, having The Unusual Suspects, the second volume, in hand I decided to soldier on.
The story opens not too far after the very first book. Sabrina (age 11) and her sister Daphne (I think age 7) have adjusted to life with their unusual grandmother in Ferryport Landing. When social services finally catch up with Granny, the children find themsevles enrolled in school at Ferryport Landing. That goes for Puck, nemesis to Sabrina and character of Twelfth Night, who features a larger role in this story as he becomes closer (in a literal sense) to the Grimm family.
Sabrina is already angry enough and preoccupied enough by her missing parents and, according to her, her own completely unaided efforts in trying to find them without dealing with school. Sabrina, in fact, wants nothing to do with school or the creepy Everafters who are teaching there. Sabrina's mistrust of the institution is confirmed when a teacher and the school's janitor turn up murdered under very strange circumstances. However, in order to investigate with her grandmother and Daphne, Sabrina is forced to go along with the whole student thing for a bit longer.
If the snark wasn't indication enough, let me point out that I am not a great fan of the Sisters Grimm novels. The more I search online, the more I seem to be in the minority. Parents love them, School Library Journal loves them, and I have yet to find a child reader who doesn't love them. But I just don't.
The reality of these books compared to the potential they books had before I read them falls painfully short. Buckley has several excellent side characters (Mr. Canis and Ferryport Landing's Mayor are my two personal favorite characters out of either book) with excellent side stories, but that isn't enough. While certain details are fleshed out, the main characters remain flat. Daphne is adorable and probably would have done better with more page-time. Puck, while entertaing is also often annoying (something Sabrina and I do agree on). The characters also never communicate. Granny, while awesome, never really knows what is going on with Sabrina. Although that doesn't matter much since Sabrina will clearly never listen to anyone about anything. Ever.
Which brings me to Sabrina, our main character. I acknowledge that Sabrina is dealing with some heavy stuff, but I hate how angry she is. Buckley makes such a point of her anger (in the very first and second books) that this one trait completely absorbs Sabrina's whole personality. All I see is an irrationally angry eleven-year-old. This unattractive trait is further emphasized in The Unusual Suspects. As a result, when it becomes apparent that an Everafter (one of the fairy tale creatures that populate Ferryport Landing) is responsible for the school killings, Sabrina seems bent on blaming all of the Everafters for the actions of one. No matter how nice any of them are to her. I don't know about anyone else, but that sounds a lot like bigotry to me.
Even if I did like Sabrina, the tone of this novel was as erratic as that of the very first novel. Buckley takes on a lot in these volumes, but not in a cohesive way. The murder scenes are described with accurate guts and gore. Meanwhile Sabrina's emotions are flattened to one word: anger. This creates an unbalanced narrative that sometimes feels like the children's novel it is and sometimes feels much darker. In my view, the writing isn't targeting a consistent audience.
Readers will have to judge for themselves, but after finishing this novel I have decided to wash my hands of the series (even though this book does end on a cliffhanger), finding that no matter how hard I wish for the characters to develop a bit more or become more self-aware, they never do.
Rated by buyers 
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The Sisters Grimm series is an awesome series. When my mother very first told me about it and I saw it, I thought it wouldn't be that cool so I didn't buy it. But then I got it from one of my friends and I read it and it was AWESOME! That immediately made me want to read the second book, so when me and mommie went to the bookstore and I saw the second book there, I really wanted to get it. Now that I got it and read it, I immediately want to read the third book.
I really liked how surprising it was when it seemed like some of the people at very first I thought were going to be the bad guys turned out to be the good guys, and some of the good guys I liked turned out to be bad guys. An example was Principle Hamelin, when we thought he was helping Rumplestiltskin but then it turned out that Rumpelstiltskin tricked him, so Principle Hamelin became good again.
Rated by buyers -
This series of Sisters Grimm books by Michael Buckley has characters familiar to adult readers and to many kids, too. The characters come from fairy tales and from other children's literature, with this author's own spin on them. The books are as entertaining for an adult to read as for a child. My nine year-old and I both read them very quickly and did not want to put them down.
We also enjoyed the Harry Potter series, but after reading these books find the Potter books to be much longer and wordier than these. These are quick reads, yet have a lot of action in few pages. We definitely recommend them.
Rated by buyers -
My girls, 8 and 10, thoroughly enjoyed this book. They are always begging for 'just a little bit more' every time we have to put the book down. They love making the connections to the fairy tale characters that they are familiar with from other stories.
Rated by buyers -
The second book in this thrilling fantasy series introducing Sabrina and Daphne's school, filled with strange mysteries. Tantilizing secrets about characters are revealed, an evil plot is discovered, and Sabrina and Daphne, as the fairy tale detectives, must find out what's going on! This fast-moving, magical, epic tale will keep you on the edge of your seat!
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