Charlesbridge Moves, 2025
Hardcover: $18.99
Genre: Children’s Middle Grade Books,
Review by Emma C. Fox
Angus Gettlefinger has a problem—his big brother Liam might be a werewolf. What other explanation could there be for Liam’s increasing scruffiness, meanness, and sneaky nocturnal escapes from their Los Angeles home?
But Angus also has a brilliant plan. He and Liam share something in common: a passion for Golden Age Hollywood films and Shakespearean insults. And Angus’s fifth-grade “legacy project” is coming due. If he can stage an original dramatic production that pulls all these threads together—a Werewolf Hamlet—maybe Liam will get the message and return to reality.
Both poignant and funny, Kerry Madden-Lunsford’s Werewolf Hamlet is a fast-paced, off-beat ode to the bonds of family and friendship—and classic Hollywood films. Short narrative chapters are interspersed with “Conversations with Liam in the Night” and quick dives into “The Brain of Angus Jack Gettlefinger”: Angus’s imagined pep-talks with his Old Hollywood heroes Harry Houdini, Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and Lon Chaney. The Los Angeles setting asserts itself as a character, too—a gritty, glamorous world where the harsh realities of drugs and foreclosures are tossed together with elegant mansions and green parakeets, and it is perfectly normal to rub shoulders with Spiderman, Batman, and Dorothy.
Like the city they call home, Angus’s family is both flawed and delightfully fun. Mom, Dad, big brother Liam, big sister Hannah, little sis Sidney, and, of course, Angus himself have vastly different personalities that often rub each other the wrong way. But they’re all held together by underlying bonds of love. Even when they make terrible choices, there’s forgiveness, reconciliation, and hope for a better tomorrow.
As an Alabama author raised in Georgia, I especially enjoyed Angus’s friend Connor, freshly arrived from Alabama, who touts the greatness of his home state, as well as Angus’s Memaw from Metter, Georgia, who proclaims in a phrase quite familiar to me, “Everything’s better in Metter!” And Angus’s best friend Zora, named after the brilliant novelist Zora Neale Hurston, is the perfect no-nonsense foil to his madcap ideas.
Werewolf Hamlet is written in a fast-paced, conversational style that will appeal to middle-grade readers. It’s also a fun read for teens and adults, who will appreciate its nuggets of psychological insight. Importantly, Angus learns it’s not up to him to “fix” his big brother. By the end of the story, he’s learning to accept what Liam is able to give and not begrudge him for what he can’t. He’s more in tune with his sisters, more able to stand up for himself when Liam pressures him, and far wiser than his brother when it comes to choosing friends. No longer intent on going it alone, Angus puts on a stellar “Werewolf Hamlet” show, with Connor, Zora, and his sisters all pitching in. It might not be enough to transform Liam back into his pre-teenage self, but the story ends on a hopeful note: no one can rewind the clock, but we can choose to move forward.
Emma Fox lives in Birmingham, Alabama, where she tutors writing and tends to her three kids and an energetic border collie. She’s the author of several award-winning YA fantasy novels, including The Arrow and the Crown and The Carver and the Queen, and a contributor to various anthologies of short stories and poems, including The Lost Tales of Sir Galahad. Visit www.emmafoxauthor.com to learn more about her work and subscribe to her free author newsletter.
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