You Are Now Old Enough to Hear This

Gr 4-7–Starmer (Night Swimming) combines magic, whimsy, and the unexpected in this exploration of one family’s history. A normal day for 12-year-old Roman Barnes is shattered when his Grandpa Henry warns him of the Toe Beast, a supposedly fictional creature rooted in family lore. When Henry dies the next day, Roman feels compelled to investigate, looking for answers in his grandfather’s house. While the search is toe free, he does locate a mysterious journal and a key to the shed, where he finds Henry, somehow alive and well. Henry explains that the Toe Beast is his doppelganger, born in the aftermath of a wood chopping accident and sustained on a diet of human hair. But while this explanation is jarring, it is merely the prelude to a host of other tales, including a girl with an ability to influence people’s wishes, a teleporting bucket, and a location in space and time that somehow links Roman’s extended family. While Starmer has built captivating hooks with interwoven threads, the payoff is too long in the making. For instance, the journal contains an important story concerning a girl and her dogs, but it is untethered to Roman’s experience and comes immediately on the heels of the Toe Beast reveal. Even Starmer seems to concede the difficulty of following the plot with a section titled, “The Chapter in Which Roman Becomes Even More ­Confused.”