Citation: Messner, Kate (2012). Capture the Flag. New York: Scholastic Press.
Summary: One night, after the Smithsonian is closed, the original American flag is stolen. As a result, all flights out of Washington D.C. are cancelled. The Society of the Silver Jaguar, a secret organization dedicated to protecting American historical artifacts, mobilizes to find the flag. So do three children whose parents are all in said organization, and they might be closer to solving the case than their parents.
Impressions: Not good. First, the good things:
- The mystery was decent, with one good twist, although I thought it was a little flawed.
- The diction was decent, too, so I could get by in the book.
Now the not-so-good:
- The Silver Jaguar Society. What the heck is this doing even existing? The last time I saw this much security over American cultural artifacts, it was a pair of binoculars that could disintegrate people. Even worse, we don't even see what they do in this book to try and catch the thief, so I can't grade how well these people do their job, but they got shown up by their kids. That's several points off right there.
- Several decisions made in the book by the main characters are kind of stupid. The tagalong kid (not one of the three I mentioned earlier) has a dog who will apparently never be able to sleep without a special toy. What does he do when he finds out this toy has gone missing? He wanders into the luggage room on his own to give it back. He promptly goes missing, courtesy of the bad guy, before he can get detained by airport security, though. Also, the thoughtful one always carries around a really heavy backpack filled with Harry Potter books. He argues that he has got to take it with him even when he and the fearless leader are running to save their new friends lives because he doesn't know when he might need it. To his credit, it sees use. As a blunt instrument. In the luggage storage room. Where there are a million different suitcases that could easily serve that purpose.
- The anti-xenophobia message really needs to be toned down. One group of suspects is a mostly-foreign orchestra dedicated to international love and peace and so on. On further reflection, this might feel like something a parody would slip in as the real bad guys. Here they're played straight, and we know that none of them could've stolen the flag because the eight-year-old son of two of the orchestra's members says so (they're very close). Also, the (Mexican-American) thoughtful one whom I guess we are supposed to admire compares the people who want immigration reform to Death Eaters. On the one hand, it's his personal opinion. On the other, his expressing it that way makes me want to Flipendo him into next week. Finally, one of the suspects is a xenophobic senator from Texas (boisterous attitude included) going up against the governor of Vermont in the primaries (whom we're supposed to admire, given the praise heaped upon her). The tone of this story means that when he is revealed as the bad guy, it's not that surprising.
In the middle are the characters, who are OK to could-use-a-little work. The eight-year-old, besides being the child of the wrongfully-accused orchestra, has a hobby of drawing visual puns of English idioms and phrases which I guess is supposed to be charming, but which I drew nothing from. The thoughtful Harry Potter fan has a list of his favorite phrases from various sources, including Albus Dumbledore. The fact that he quotes Albus Dumbledore may interest people, but he didn't click with me (in any case, I'm not letting his wizarding-Nazi crack about anyone slide). Apart from those two, things are fine on that department. I just wish that the authoress had done a few things differently...
...Come to think of it, if I ever had an "OK, you write it" event at the library, where I ask patrons and staff to take books they read and show how they would've written the book, I could use this book and my own idea of how I would've done it as a guide. Other people seem to be able to read it and like it, with Jackie from My Tower of Books saying: "I thought this was an enjoyable book with spunk. I loved the friendships that were formed throughout and I'm assuming these same friendships will continue if there were to be a sequel. This would make a nice Indiana Jones-esque series for this age group." I just didn't like it that much.
Auxiliary sources:
Jackie (20 Jun, 2012). My Tower of Books: MG Review: Capture the Flag by Kate Messner. My Tower of Books. Retrieved from http://mytowerofbooks.blogspot.com/2012/06/mg-review-capture-flag-by-kate-messner.html
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