Emma and the Blue Genie

by Cornelia Funke Narrated by Cornelia Funke

Overview

The beloved and bestselling author of Inkheart brings her signature imagination, adventure, and humor to a magical full-color chapter book for young readers!
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One night, Emma finds a mysterious green bottle floating in the ocean. When she pulls out the stopper, she sets a blue genie free! Most genies grant three wishes, but Karim can't grant even one anymore. A yellow genie stole his magic nose ring, leaving him small, powerless, and trapped in that bottle. Emma and her noodle-tailed dog have to help Karim get his nose ring-and his magic-back!

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

09/08/2014
Funke (the Inkheart trilogy) spins her fictional magic in this witty novel, written in 2002 and newly translated by Latsch, starring an eight-year-old girl with four pesky brothers. At night, Emma and her dog Tristan escape to the chilly beach, where “the moon poured a silver highway onto the water,” at the end of which she envisions a warm land with camels and palm trees. One evening, she finds a bottle containing Karim, a despondent blue genie who has been left “as small as a desert hedgehog and as weak as a nosebug” ever since an evil yellow genie stole his enchanted nose ring. Emma and Tristan accompany Karim back to his home turf—the land of her dreams—on his flying carpet. In a swift-moving sequence of events, the villainous genie kidnaps and cages Emma and Tristan before they and Karim collude to defeat him. Funke’s visual descriptions and playful dialogue lift this above standard good-versus-evil fantasy fare, while Meyer’s full-color spot illustrations underpin the text’s humor. Ages 7–10. Author’s agent: Jenny Savill, Andrew Nurnberg Associates. (Oct.)

School Library Journal

08/01/2014
Gr 2–4—Eight-year-old Emma and her pup Tristan wander out to the beach one night to sit and dream of faraway lands. What this girl and her "noodle-tailed dog" don't expect is for her wishes to be answered by a glowing bottle bobbing along in the waves. When she opens the bottle, she frees a blue genie named Karim who was imprisoned by a wicked yellow genie and thrown into the sea. Though Karim was deprived of most of his powers, he is determined to journey back to his master, the caliph of Barakash. Emma and Tristan yearn to have an adventure of their own, and so they join their blue friend in a magical journey to a land straight out of a desert fairy tale. While the tropes of this story will doubtless be familiar, the author's love of spirited heroines and skilled hand at prose make this a pleasure to read and share. Full-color illustrations, many full page, bring the characters to life and make this a great pick for younger readers just getting into longer chapter books. A fun fantasy romp.—Stephanie Whelan, New York Public Library

OCTOBER 2014 - AudioFile

There are distinct benefits to hearing this audiobook read by its author. There’s no ambiguity about the mood, and the pacing is perfect, with pauses in all the right places. When Emma goes for a moonlit walk with her steadfast dog, Tristan, she finds a blue genie trapped in his bottle and releases him. Karim, however, cannot grant Emma the customary three wishes because an evil yellow genie has stolen his powerful and magical nose ring. Emma and Tristan join Karim on a magic carpet quest to retrieve the stolen ring. Cornelia Funke delivers straightforward humor and breathless suspense in a style usually reserved for older listeners. Her soft, low German-accented voice will captivate elementary-school listeners with its exotic air of adventure. L.T. © AudioFile 2014, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews

2014-07-16
Emma and her dog, Tristan, steal down to the moonlit sea for some quiet time and find a mysterious bottle bobbing on the waves; inside, of course, is a genie. Karim can't grant wishes; he's the one who needs help. Evil genie Sahim stole his nose ring, source of his power, and imprisoned him in the bottle. Emma, Tristan and Karim head via flying carpet for Barakash, where Sahim now rules, to recover the nose ring and free the city's caliph and citizens. Meyer's whimsical art is packed with quirky details and expressive humor (the supercilious dromedary's a delight), neatly enhancing Funke's droll humor. First published in Germany in 2002, this entertaining tale has plenty of charm, but it will have an uncomfortable aftertaste for some. This Disney-fied Arabian Nights territory draws from the well of Western popular culture, where normal is fair and cute, exotic is dark and comically alien, and color's a reliable indicator for good and evil. The flying carpet and palace are beautiful; the caliph's grandmother is "a big woman with a beard and blue patterns on her face." With tight word counts, restrictive vocabulary and language parameters, chapter books rely on their audience to fill in details from shared cultural assumptions. In an increasingly diverse society, notions of what is normal and what is exotic to readers call for frequent reassessment. Training wheels for Funke's future fans. (Fantasy. 7-9)

Product Details

BN ID:	2940171874902
Publisher:	Penguin Random House
Publication date:	10/14/2014
Edition description:	Unabridged
Age Range:	8 - 11 Years

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