Ruby Wishfingers: King of the Castle

by Deborah Kelly

Ruby is back, with twelve new wishes! And one missing wish from last spring that is still floating about in the garden somewhere...

Jellybean is once again making mischief for Ruby, until she discovers the perfect way to make her little brother do exactly what she says. But Cousin Todd isn’t so keen on doing what Ruby says.

When Todd stumbles across Ruby's missing wish he decides to teach her a lesson about being bossy, and make a few rules of his own.

Meet Australia's new king and explore a country where school, homework, manners and peas are all banned. Discover monster trucks, giant jumping castles, furious principals and hungry crocodiles along with plenty of laughs in an all new Ruby Wishfingers adventure.

Genres: Chapter Books

96 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 2017

Reviews

[Carla · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the fourth book in the Ruby Wishfingers series. These are very quick, short chapter books, about a young girl who has inherited wishes from an ancestor. Her wishes come once a year, based on her age. This book she is twelve, therefore she gets twelve wishes. Once she uses all those wishes, she has to wait a year to get a new bunch. Ruby's little brother, nicknamed Jellybean, also has magical abilities but his are different. He has the ability to make things appear and disappear. Being only two years old, Ruby and her Granny have to keep an eye on him. In the last book, he made all Ruby's wishes disappear and when they reappeared, they were all hiding in the garden. One of them was never found, until now. Cousin Todd finds the wish and uses it. The story tells us about his wish and the repercussions of it.

The thing I like about this series is that Ruby learns a lesson in each book, but they are not hit you over the head type lessons. Her Granny is also in all these stories as her guide or mentor. I also like that her family is involved in all the stories and is very important to her. Throw in a talking cat, and it is a fun, quick ride from start to finish. This is another fun book that younger children will enjoy, especially little girls. I recommend this book for family, classroom, school and public libraries for children from 5 to 8. It is a great beginning chapter book for those children that are ready for that or a read aloud if not. The publisher generously provided me with a copy of this book via netgalley.

[Shes_a_book_geek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review can be also found at www.littlebigreads.com

If you haven’t met Ruby Wishfingers before, you wouldn’t know that she gets 12 wishes a year, these make her fingers tingle and need to be used thoughtfully. You also wouldn’t know that her parent’s don’t believe these wishes exist, that her brother Jellybean can make things appear and disappear, and that grandma has wishes too. These wishes were inherited from Ruby’s great great great great grandfather Wishfingers.

Last spring, Ruby Wishfingers lost one of her wishes and wants to find it with the help of her cousin Todd. Before Ruby can search she uses some of her new wishes on her little brother Jellybean because of his mischievousness, many of which are funny…but not to Ruby. Once the search gets underway, Todd quickly finds the missing wish but he decides not to give it back to Ruby and creates havoc across town.

Ruby Wishfingers lives in Australia, and her books are just the right size for your new reader. Small chapters which are easy to read, with a constantly exciting storyline will see the book finished in no time. This is not the first book about Ruby, with three prior to this one that are just as full of adventure as this one.

For any girl or boy (or grownup too) that likes glitter, sparkles, lots of mischievousness, family, and someone with great imagination, then Ruby Wishfingers: King of the Castle is definitely one that needs to be on your list to read.

So, what happens when Todd creates havoc with the missing wish? We can talk about that when you read the book!

Want more Ruby? Check out her awesome site: http://www.rubywishfingers.com.au/

Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this book.

[Liz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Twelve-year-old Ruby Wishfingers can do what the rest of us can only dream of—she can make her wishes come true. All she has to do is make a wish and blows on the end of her fingers. She doesn’t have unlimited wishes, but they renew each year.

Ruby’s new wishes have just appeared—twelve in all—and she is making plans for how best to use them. But her two-year-old brother, Jellybean, keeps getting into trouble with his own magic powers. Ruby starts using her wishes to help Jellybean and to keep her parents from finding out about his magic.

Ruby is an interesting character, but Jellybean really steals the show in this book. He’s your typical toddler, complete with unreasonable demands and fits, baby-talk and silliness, and a little mischief to round out the day! As parents read this book to their own children, the antics of Jellybean will make them smile as they think back on their kids’ toddler days.

I received an advance reader copy of this book in exchange for my unbiased review.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

Silly is the best way to describe this series of books, of which this is the fourth one in the series. I have a read the first two, and was deligahted that I was able to read this one as well. This sorry grows on you, and once you get the weird humor of take situations that wishing gets one inato, then you can sit back and enjoy the ride, so to speak.
'
These are very quick, very short chapter books, about a young girl who has inherited wishes, but they come in bunches, and once you have run out, you've run out. In this story, her brother apparently has no limit, but he is only two years old, but working with him is tricky.

Silly, fast, cute characters. What more could you ask for, or a young child, making there way into chapter books, need?

Highly recommend this series for chapter books for kids to get into. With a talking cat, and clueless parents, it is a fun, quick ride from start to finish.


Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review

[Richelle Zirkle · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fun chapter book for young readers. Ruby has inherited magical wishes. When one goes missing and her parents seem to have fallen ill, she'll have to find a way to keep the magic from causing chaos. Her little brother and her cousin will get in the way and add their own crazy touch to the situation. Will Ruby be able to get things back to normal? Children will love finding out what happens and seeing if Ruby gets control over the magic again.

I received an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Having read and enjoyed books 1&2 of this series with my 7yr old daughter we were excited to be approved for book 4 via netgalley. We hadn't read book three but knowing that book 2 gave you a glimpse of book 1 I was confident missing a book wouldn't matter, in this respect I was correct there were short bursts of each book mentioned through this one. Sadly though my daughter gave up on this one and I finished it alone and to be fair I agree with her that this story felt shorter than the others (maybe this was due to the refreshers of the three previous books) somehow it just wasn't as exciting as the first two.

[Skylor43 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book! Although I am an 8 year old, and this book was a bit easy for me, it had a great moral. "Kids still have a lot to learn, so they're not experienced enough in life to lead the country." I liked all the wishes in the story. I want to read another in the series.

[Nicki Jeffery · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book! So creative and inspirational. Thank you Deborah Kelly. I'm looking forward to reading more Ruby Wishfingers books.

[Schizanthus Nerd · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've read all of the Ruby Wishfingers books that have been published so far and really enjoy the positive characters, Leigh Hedstrom's adorable illustrations and the imaginative storylines. I confess I've already read Ruby Wishfingers: King of the Castle but during my first read I didn't find it as enchanting as the previous novels.

When I was given the opportunity to receive a copy from NetGalley (thank you very much to NetGalley, Wombat Books and Rhiza Press for the opportunity) in exchange for honest feedback, I was interested to find out if a second read would change my mind about this one or if I'd work out what put me off the first time around. I'm glad I did as it turned out I loved this the second time around and have concluded that during my first read I must have been having one of those 'nothing is ever good enough' critical days where I just needed to get over myself.

Ruby inherited her Wishfingers magic from several generations ago. When she's granted wishes she feels a tingling in her fingertips and to use them she makes a wish and blows on the tips of her fingers. Ruby is a lovely girl and usually ends up using a lot of her wishes to help other people or to fix problems that arise due to the unexpected fallout from previous wishes. She's learned to be very careful regarding what she wishes for and remembers that it is very helpful to always have a spare wish, just in case.

Ruby is not the only Wishfingers with magic. Granny inherited some magic as well and she is helpful in providing guidance to Ruby. Also, Ruby has recently discovered that her younger brother, Jellybean, has inherited some magic of his own! In the previous book, Hide-and-Seek, Ruby loses one of her wishes and it is still missing at the beginning of this book.

When Ruby gets mad at Jellybean after wasting three of her new wishes on remedying problems he has created, she manipulates Jellybean into doing whatever she wants by declaring herself Queen Ruby and playing a game of Queen Ruby Says with him. Cousin Todd comes to visit and with Ruby still on her power trip, she begins bossing him around. Todd finds Ruby's missing wish and decides that no one will be able to tell him what to do if he's the King of Australia. Chaos ensues!

I definitely enjoyed this book more the second time around. I love that there are consequences for any poor decisions made, lessons are learned and children apologise for bad behaviour without having an adult tell them they have to. I look forward to reading the fifth book, Funny Money, upon its release and am interested to discover how the twist at the end of this book is explored.