Ruby in the Smoke
Philip Pullman. Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, $11.95 (230pp) ISBN 978-0-394-88826-2
Pullman's Victorian melodrama boasts a sufficiency of mystery, murder and hairbreadth escapes involving a big cast of honest and ignoble types. ""On a cold, fretful afternoon in early October 1872,'' the story begins, young Sally Lockhart is in London where she tries to find out the meaning of ``the Seven Blessings.'' The phrase appears in a message from her recently deceased father, drowned in the South China Sea. When a colleague of her father hears the words, he dies instantly of a heart attack. That event marks the start of crises that go on with no let-up in the colorful Dickensian tale. Sally's legacy, supposedly a fantastic ruby, is nowhere to be found. A gang of cutthroats pursue the girl and her loyal allies, as the story sweeps on to a resounding close. (12-up)
Details
Reviewed on: 05/01/1987
Genre: Children's
Analog Audio Cassette - 978-1-4000-8511-8
Compact Disc - 978-0-7393-6781-0
Downloadable Audio - 1 pages - 978-0-7393-3021-0
Hardcover - 230 pages - 978-0-394-98826-9
Mass Market Paperbound - 240 pages - 978-0-394-89589-5
Paperback - 256 pages - 978-0-375-84516-1
Paperback - 209 pages - 978-1-4071-1169-8
Paperback - 209 pages - 978-0-439-94366-6
Paperback - 209 pages - 978-1-4071-5419-0
Paperback - 209 pages - 978-1-4071-3054-5
Prebound-Glued - 978-0-8124-7318-6
Prebound-Glued - 240 pages - 978-0-8335-2603-8
Prebound-Other - 230 pages - 978-0-606-04047-1
Prebound-Sewn - 978-1-4178-3148-7
