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Overview
The Fart Powder was such a successful invention that Doctor Proctor, Nilly, and Lisa couldn’t stop there. Next up: a time-travelling bathtub. You just hop in, lather up the Time Soap, and wish for where you’d like to go. Doctor Proctor has plans for this new invention. You see, he lost his true love years ago, when Juliette Margarine married an evil count. The good Doctor has never quite gotten over this, and he's going back to change it. But when things go wrong, it's up to Nilly and Lisa to travel back in time to right all wrongs and reunite the two lovebirds. Nothing is quite so simple in a Jo Nesbo book. Enter a herd of hippos, a scheming assistant, and Time Soap that keeps going awry, sending Nilly and Lisa to the storming of the Bastille! Fortunately, as in every Jo Nesbo book, the Fart Powder solves everything.
Editorials
Children's Literature -
Doctor Proctor has invented some crazy things. His latest invention is a time-traveling bathtub. Just fill the tub with the special bubbles and jump in. Doctor Proctor goes back in history to reclaim his beloved Juliette Margarine but things go wrong and he can't get back. A mysterious postcard, dated 1888, leads Lisa and Nilly from Oslo to Paris in search of Doctor Proctor. Nilly and Lisa can only help by going back in time through the bathtub. Along the way things get mixed up and Nilly and Lisa end up in separate places. The two of them travel through French history sometimes meeting up with Doctor Proctor or Juliette Margarine. They visit an early Tour de France race, Joan of Arc, Napoleon, the Battle of Waterloo and Gustave Eiffel. But all the while Dr. Proctor's former assistant, now evil, who wishes revenge against him, is tracking them. Readers will have to know some of the historical figures and time periods to really appreciate the subtle humor; if not, the reader might feel lost. Also, there is a low key grown up love story, which may dissuade some readers for this age group. Reviewer: Denise HartzlerSchool Library Journal
Gr 4–6—Tiny dynamo Nilly and his friend Lisa, first introduced in Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder (S & S, 2010), return to save the day (and the doctor). At the end of their last outing, Doctor P. headed back to Paris to save the love of his life, Juliette Margarine, from having to marry evil Claude Cliché. A mysterious postcard from the past sends Nilly and Lisa on a mission to rescue him, both helped and hindered by the doctor's crazy inventions, including a time-traveling bathtub and translating nose plugs. A whirlwind tour of French history ensues, including stops at the Moulin Rouge, the Tour de France, Waterloo, the Bastille, Monsieur Eiffel's workroom, and Joan of Arc's jail cell, with our heroes changing history right and left. Chasing them through time is Raspa, Proctor's one-legged former assistant, inventor of time-travel soap, who makes the ultimate sacrifice to atone for past misdeeds. This story is darker and less icky than the first, though it still has plenty of goofy moments, a few farts, and a mostly happy ending. Buy where the first book is popular.—Mara Alpert, Los Angeles Public LibraryKirkus Reviews
Spun from the quirky cast and gaseous premise introduced in Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder (2010), this even sillier sequel expelled by the popular Norwegian crime novelist sends young Lisa and Nilly from Oslo to Paris and from the Middle Ages to Napoleon's tent on the eve of Waterloo. Their aim? To rescue their eccentric inventor friend Victor Proctor and the love of his youth, Juliette Margarine. Despite pursuit by Juliette's crimelord husband Claude Cliché and his gang of lookalike thugs, the young folk help to reunite the lovers. They also, with help from the puissant blasting powder of the title and a bathtub time machine, save the Doctor from the guillotine, call off the battle of Waterloo, dance on the stage of the Moulin Rouge, inspire Gustave Eiffel to build a tower, trick Columbus into thinking he's landed in India and other historical feats. Though Lowery's illustrations are too rare and sketchy to have much influence and a significant character seems to have been trucked in just to be killed off later, the tale burbles comically along and everything comes out right...in the...end. (Light fantasy. 10-12)