The Twilight Gate [Hardcover]

George, Leigh and Mindy think things can't get much worse after their father is killed in a car crash, but then their mother develops cancer. Too weak from chemotherapy to take care of them, she sends them to spend the summer in the woods with her ex-husband, a troubled Vietnam veteran. To comfort the youngest, Mindy, George writes and illustrates a book of stories about a unicorn named Rosebud. Somehow, through a magic he does not understand, George opens a cosmic gate through which he brings Rosebud--a bright creature of light and grace--in the hopes that she might heal his mother. The gate also lets in an army of weevils, malevolent creatures that threaten to kill him, his sisters and mother. George, Leigh and Mindy must discover how to close the gate, but the price will be high. Using elements from Buddhism, unicorn lore and archetypal nightmares, Salsitz creates a plausible enough explanation of the magic that flows through this gripping fantasy-thriller. Riveting fight scenes and wrenching depictions of the children's emotional struggles result in first-rate suspense. Illustrations not seen by PW. Ages 12-up.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Grade 5-8-- While Caroline Walsh undergoes chemotherapy, she sends her children to spend the summer with her ex-husband. (Her second husband, the children's father, was killed in a car accident.) George, 16, is the first to notice the menacing, red-eyed driver who follows him and his sisters out of the city, but it soon becomes apparent to 12-year-old Leigh and 6-year-old Mindy that mysterious and dangerous forces are at work. First, they are pursued by ember-eyed man-beasts called weevils, and then Rosebud, a wise unicorn, appears to help defend them. She tries to explain the imbalance between the forces of good and evil that has drawn her through the Twilight Gate from her own world to this one, but the siblings are too busy fighting for their lives to fully comprehend her story. Readers may be equally busy trying to follow the many disparate themes and elements presented here. The book begins in war-torn Vietnam with totally realistic events that are not explained or alluded to again until much later, and then jumps immediately to the present, as the children leave home with the weevils in hot pursuit. Realism is counterbalanced by fantasy throughout, with the changing relationships among the characters shaped and reshaped by the presence of the fantasy figures as well as by more natural, expected events. Many plot elements are mentioned but never fully developed. The presence of the werewolf-like weevils is never totally explained but the battle against them is entirely compelling, drawing readers rapidly to a satisfying conclusion in spite of the loose ends, which are hastily knotted together. Just as in real life, neither all questions are answered nor all problems solved, but the most immediate battles have been won and there is hope for the future. --Susan L. Rogers, Chestnut Hill Academy, PA
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Stoner, nightmare-ridden Vietnam vet, has achieved a fragile peace in his remote cabin until his ex-wife, going through chemotherapy, sends him the three children from her second marriage. They bring along anxiety about their mother; grief over their father's recent death; their own demons (``weevils,'' according to five-year-old Mindy), who seek to kill them; and ``Rosebud,'' an imaginary unicorn created by George, the eldest. Rosebud materializes to aid them against their evil foes, but it's Stoner--with the help of Buddhist blessings he received after a generous act in Cambodia--who defeats chief Weevil Anubis and unites the family. Too much here is poorly digested or unexplained: there may be powerful parallels between the hells of chemotherapy, Vietnam, and a bad marriage, but why are the slavering, wolf-like Weevils after the family? Why is their chief called Anubis? Who and what is Rosebud? Why does it matter that Stoner is Mindy's father, or that George may have been driving when his father was killed? Facile but unresolved, and not much helped by Clark's literal-minded b&w art. (Fiction. 12+) -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.