Title: The 13-Story Treehouse
Date: 2011
Publisher: Square Fish (Feiwel and Friends / Macmillan / Mackids)
Writer: Andy Griffiths
Artist: Terry Denton
This is another one of those kids books that blurs the line between prose and graphic novel.
Andy and Terry live in a 13-story treehouse with all the latest mad-science gadgetry, including a marshmallow-shooting machine, a secret underground lab, a catapult, and a giant banana.
They've also got one day to finish the book they promised their publisher and they haven't done a thing on it all year.
This was funny in a lot of places, and there were some clever bits like a cute tribute to King Kong, and a running gag about the dangers of ordering Sea Monkey eggs.
But it never really felt like there was much at stake. Terry and Andy have all manner of ridiculous good fortune, not to mention all the latest mad science to bail them out of everything they get into. Really all they ever do is avoid work, as things get more and more outrageous around them only for them to have all their problems solved while they mostly just watch it happen.
There are some good details and a lot of funny jokes here, but it wasn't enough to hold my interest, and the main characters are not all that appealing.
Rating: 4/10
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