There's been a renewed interest in spirit animals recently. Scholastic has their Spirit Animals series with the online game component and several different authors (similar to the way 39 Clues and Infinity Ring are organized). And now there is the first in a series featuring the character of Brody Boondoggle, along with his Grammy and big brother Jake. Brody and Jake are spending time with their grandmother and during a walk in the woods, Grammy and Brody find an akaway. What's an akaway? "Oh, about 50 pounds," said Grammy. "Maybe a little more after a big meal." (There are silly moments like that all through the book, many of them based on Grammy mishearing something the boys have said.) Actually, an akaway is a magical creature with the ability to connect kids to their spirit animals. Brody can see it, but Jake can't - which makes it hard to convince his brother that they need to help the creature. What follows is a quest to find a portal to another dimension, with the necessary villains to try and stop our heroes.
 
There is action, humor, typical brotherly teasing and arguing, a really cool grandmother (even if she can't hear very well), a jealous friend, bad guys to dislike, and magical possibilities. I think one of my favorite things about the book is the explanation that children don't connect with their spirit animals any more because they are so busy with video games and electronic devices. It makes sense that if you are not connected to nature and really aware of it, then you can't connect to your spirit animal. If you enjoy adventures and stories of kids trying to save the world or endangered species, then you'll have fun with Brody.
 
I read an e-book provided by the publisher through NetGalley. It will be published on February 25, 2014.

A cute adventure story aimed at young boys - 7-10 at a guess, and designed to encourage them to play outside instead of spending their time in the computer-game world.

This book was a LOT of fun - the characters of Jake and Brody were immediately likeable and immediately realistic. I did find the jumping viewpoint a little confusing at first: the chapters are so short that one minute you're in Jake's head, the next in Brody's, but once I slowed down my reading speed a little it became rather easier. The random conversation topics spattered throughout the text were highly entertaining, and I am wondering if the author garnered them from his own two boys, whom I imagine are a lot like Jake and Brody.

Some of the plot seemed a little forced - the fact that Jake stayed up all night basically reading every single book about the spirit animals that he could find seemed rather a convenient excuse to give him instant knowledge on everything important, but I would very much doubt a teenage boy would read that fast and retain that much. Still, this is not exactly a logical book - it is a tale to entertain and amuse the young fellows, who will not be analysing everything: like how a fish could walk and whether the Crab skittered sideways.

Overall, this was a great romp and would be exceptionally fun to read to a young audience. If I ever find myself in the situation where I have my tablet and are required to amuse a young boy (aged 6-9) then I shall certainly be reading this one! Heck, maybe it might inspire them to put down the game console and go outside, climb a tree or throw a snowball (but not a rock) and get in touch with their own spirit animal.

What is your spirit animal? Is it a rhinoceros beetle, a bug that can lift 850 times its weight? Is it a determined and catlike spotted ocelot that will fight to the death? Or maybe a rainbow trout, with its keen sense of direction? According to the legend in Gary Karton’s kids book “The Last Akaway,” all kids have spirit animals that give them magical animal-like powers.

Inspired by his kids

Karton’s book, the first in a trilogy, (that’s a series of three books), follows two brothers as they seek to save the Akaway, a magical animal that helps kids connect with their spirit animal. The adventure through snowy woods includes a talking crab, but Karton drew a lot of his inspiration from real-life experiences. The main characters are named after his sons, and Karton sought to make the dialogue realistic, like something he would hear his children say.

“I never really thought about writing kids books until I was reading with my kids,” said Karton, who lives in Arlington with his wife and sons Jake, 14, and Brody, 12. His boys, he said, wanted him to write a book that was unpredictable. So he did.

“I’m just going to write a book that I would really like,” Karton recalled thinking. “I love animals. I love special powers and I love having fun.” He wrote the first draft of “The Last Akaway” in about four months.

“I was just trying to type as fast I could to figure out where my imagination was going,” he said.

Reading as a challenge

Growing up in Chicago, Illinois, with a learning disability, Karton didn’t like to read. “My memory of school was tough,” he said. “I felt stupid because I could never [read] very well.”

What Karton lacked in natural ability, he made up for in determination and creativity. As a kid he liked to make up games with his best friend, such as a Ping Pong obstacle course.

“I was a big daydreamer,” he said. “I dreamed all the time.”

When Karton was in college, he hated going to the library to do research. Reading was still hard for him. Instead, he would find experts on the topic that he needed to write about and call them for an interview. (He later used those interview skills while working as a sports reporter at The Washington Post.) And when Karton was writing, rewriting and editing his book — which took two years after that first draft — he went to the experts again: this time, kids.

“I had a group of 10 kids and . . . every time I would write something, I would talk to the kids and they would say, ‘This is funny,’ ‘This is not funny,’ ” he said. “I have been criticized for listening to kids too much, but I think kids are amazing and honest, and they have so much creativity.”

Karton was rejected by 12 publishers, or companies that get books out to the public. But he never got discouraged.

“I’m a big believer in perseverance,” said Karton, who is writing the second book in his series while working for Safe Kids, a nonprofit organization dedicated to keeping kids safe around the world.

Special powers

When Karton was a kid, he used to try to get spiders to bite him in hopes that it would give him special powers, like Spider-Man’s. That trick never worked. But as an adult, he realized that everyone has special powers.

“It’s hard to be different, but so good to be different,” Karton said. “Everyone has at least one special power that makes them extraordinary.”

Like the characters in his book, Brody and Jake, you just have to figure out what your special power is, he said.

— Moira E. McLaughlin