Whales on Stilts

Pals in Peril #1

by M.T. Anderson, Marc Cashman (Narrator)

3 Hours and 3 Minutes

Lily Gefelty is just an average twelve-year-old girl. But her dad–a normal-enough seeming guy–just so happens to work for an evil genius who plans to unleash an army of extremely cranky, stilt-walking, laser-beam-eyed whales upon the world. Lucky for Lily, her two best friends are anything but average. Both of them are famous for their adventures. Jasper Dash, Boy Technonaut, invents gadgets; Katie Mulligan spends her spare time fighting off zombies and were-goats. Surely they'll know what to do. And if they don't? then it will be up to Lily–average, everyday Lily–to come up with a plan.

With this crazy comic ride of a novel, M. T. Anderson launches a riotous and wonderfully weird new series for listeners who like their thrilling tales with tongue firmly in cheek.

Genres: Science Fiction, Humor, Middle Grade, Fantasy, Adventure, Fiction, Childrens

3 pages, Audio CD

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Matthew Tobin Anderson (M. T. Anderson), (1968- ) is an author, primarily of picture books for children and novels for young adults. Anderson lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

His picture books include Handel Who Knew What He Liked; Strange Mr. Satie; The Serpent Came to Gloucester; and Me, All Alone, at the End of the World. He has written such young adult books as Thirsty, Burger Wuss, Feed, The Game of Sunken Places, and Octavian Nothing. For middle grader readers, his novels include Whales on Stilts: M. T. Anderson's Thrilling Tales and its sequel, The Clue of the Linoleum Lederhosen.
-Wikipedia

Reviews

[Krista · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this up for my kid at the library, flipped through it real quick to scan for possible emotional potholes and decided that it was so ironic and tongue-in-cheek that it would be fine.

And it was. My son laughed and laughed and laughed. Then I read it and laughed and laughed and laughed. MT Anderson is funny. And funny in a way that appeals to a seven year old and his jaded mother. Both.

This is not one of those books that tries too hard to be clever. This is one of those books that just simply IS clever. The very embodiment of it. Ostensibly a spoof of the children's literature of the 50s and 60s it is also an homage; an homage to Nancy Drew and Tom Swift and the pulp, series children's books of that era. There is the promotion of Gargletine, Jasper Dash's drink of choice and fake ads for books starring Jasper Dash (the Tom Swift character who says things like "Great Scott! Will these cads never cease mocking my jumpsuit?") and Katie Mulligan (kind of cross between Nancy Drew and Buffy the Vampire Slayer). One of the fake ads features an asterisk next to the declaration "AVAILABLE AT FINE STORES NEAR YOU!" The accompanying footnote, which occupies the bottom of seven pages, starts thusly; "No longer available on the shelves at fine stores near you. Available now exclusively and by special arrangement on the shelves of old vacation rental cottages, where you can often find Jasper Dash books in the living room, as well as old National Geographics, Chinese checkers, half colored-in Herbie the Love Bug activity books from 1978, used up Mad Libs, and dog-eared, boring novels for adults by Leon Uris, Colleen McCullough, and James Michener, I mean big, thick books with names like Space and Novel, you know what I mean ... all the books are dry and yellow from the sun, and all of them have wrinkly pages from the salt water, and when you flip through them, sand falls out as if it was index cards marking the place of former summers ..."

The dialogue runs from clever to even more clever and nothing is sacred.

"The whale fired his laser-beam eyes. The girls felt the jolt as the laser beam bounced off the mirror. Of course the girls didn't feel the jolt as the laser bounced off the mirror, because lasers are just light. This story is highly scientific, and I would never mislead you. I want to depict whale eye-laser technology as accurately as possible. Instantaneously the laser doubled back on itself, a continuous stream of light-using all the standard oculo-incendiary prohulsifiers and megegolisms that you'd expect ..."

And the "Guide for Reading and Thinking" was a nice touch.

Anderson continued Whales on Stilts into a series called Pals in Peril. I've not yet read the follow-up books but if they are only 50 percent as clever and enjoyable as this one, they will be worth your time.

Highly recommend.

[Kaethe · Rating 5 out of 5]

2010, January 23

Oh, I'm loving this. I'm trying to force the Offspring into loving it, too, by reading passages aloud, but no one else is hooked. Funniest concept since Howie Monroe and the Doghouse of Doom.

***

If the Spouse wrote a parody of children's series books, it would be this book. I recommend it to adults who'll laugh at jokes about the British invasion and David Bowie's eyes.

***

Now I'm reading it aloud to the KitKatPandaBatWolf. I love this little book.

Library copy

[Briar's Reviews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Middle grade imagination just hits different.

Whales on Stilts is one of the weirdest yet most delightful books I've read in a while! The title and cover alone... whales... on stilts? As soon as I saw it, I had to pick it up. I'm not opposed to reading middle grade books. Adult novels aren't always as adventurous as middle grade novels, and a good chunk of middle grade novels can be read by adults and not feel like you're reading a children's book.

This book definitely felt like I was reading a kids book, but I didn't care. It was fun, absolutely hilarious, and out of this world wild. Lily Gefelty goes to work with her Dad and just knows something is up. He works in an abandoned warehouse where they are making stilts for whales. As if that's just NORMAL. Her Dad is utterly clueless, but Lily knows something bad is going on. She teams up with Jasper Dash and Katie Mulligan, her best friends, and they begin to investigate... Of course, there's a mad scientist working there and he's going to be doing some bad things... Never mess with a middle grader!

Phenomenal. Honestly, I wish I had more fun books like this when I was younger. We had the same, boring books... and this book is old enough that it could have been in our library! What a waste! Books like this are why kids pick up a joy for reading. I'm so glad I had the chance to read it and I hope to pick up more of M.T. Anderson's middle grade books ASAP.

Five out of five stars.

[Qt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Here's a kind of a different little story--I found it quite funny and amusing, and a neat spoof on B movies. Amongst the silliness of whales on stilts taking over the world, though, there are also some more thoughtful points, like how the heroine is not as flashy or brilliant or outgoing as her friends are--yet she still saves the day. Also there are one or two really beautiful passages that are kind of startling, coming as they do sandwiched in between the humor.
I also liked the hilarious "questions for study" at the end. One of my favorites: "What is the theme of this book? Hum it in its entirety."
(as in, musical theme)

[Maddy · Rating 4 out of 5]

M.T. ANDERSON
What a silly book! haha seriously it's about whales on stilts and 3 kids who save the world, and I loved it. I admit I'm a little past that stage in my reading, but MT Anderson is so clever; there are jokes for all ages of readers. I especially loved the spoof on "Ovaltine", which I drink every morning. "Gargletine" didn't sound so bad! I recommend this for any age--from grade school up to anyone who wants a really quick and very entertaining read! Super clever, super giggly, and I'm definitely buying this for my 9-year-old brother for Christmas.

[Mayday Maddie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This has to be the strangest book I've ever read. I picked it up because M.T. Anderson (*feed*) had written it. What did I learn?

A. M.T. Anderson is not consitent at all when writing books.
B. M.T. Anderson likes carrot cake.
C. A rhinoplasty is another word for a cosmetic surgery (according to M.T.)
D. Whales. Are. Scary.


No further comment.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is absolutely hilarious, but don't take it from me. Take it from the third-grade book club I read it with at Booker T. Washington Elementary School. They are now enthralled with whales, mad scientists, and goofy gadgets. They're also planning how to fight an army of laser-eyed whales on stilts: kickboxing robots will save us from the impending Whalepocalypse.

[Deeann · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved, loved, loved this book ! Thanks Zoe's human for the review which prompted me to investigate this little treasure !!

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whales with laser-beam eyes. I love this so much!

I can sort of see some readers finding this too cute. Or tediously ironic. So read at your own risk, I guess, but this is very much my thing!

[Nicole · Rating 1 out of 5]

While it pains me to give the literary love of my good friend's life a single star, it's something I feel I must do.

The humor was wry, which I appreciate, but somehow off the mark. I could see how some people might find this book hysterically funny, I really could. But like watching the movie The 40 Year Old Virgin, I was the cheese standing alone NOT laughing. I have no doubt other find it funny, but I am not others and I simply didn't buy in. Sigh.

Too over the top. Who is his intended audience, anyway?

[Kevin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Listened to this during our trip to Minnesota and back at the request of my daughter. If you like silly and over-the-top satire for young adults this is pretty clever and well done. Might not be everyone's taste however ...

[Carl Waluconis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is published for Young Readers, but it has so much humor based on old series such as the Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew, that it seems at times intended for adults. Adults could read it and any of the other books in this MT Anderson series as a kind of lark, even camp. The author has written amazing serious Young Adult such as "Feed" and "The Short Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation", each of which I give 5 stars. However, how to "star" a book such as "Whales on Stilts"? The whole star ranking system is an insult to many books, making a judgement almost always without context. Getting that little rant on ranking done, I had a lot of fun reading this book. It even has some barbs pointed at the publishing industry in general, which often creates books for Young Adults based solely on measuring social data. Count those "likes" in Facebook, and write your next "Twilight". I never could read the Hardy Boys, etc., but I still greatly enjoyed this spoof. I do not think it is a spoiler to say the villain whale has a sad fate in defeat, but I guess not as pointed as the fate of Moby Dick.

[Brent · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is clearly a book for kids but it was a lot of fun. It reminded me that funny stories can also be fun instead of taking themselves so seriously.

[Brigid Keely · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Whales on Stilts (Pals in Peril #1) by M. T. Anderson, was recommended to me by a friend who picked it up for a reluctant reader. It did the trick for that kid. My kid isn't reading on his own yet, not really (he needs a bit of help to get through a level 1 reader and gets really tired reading an entire short book by himself) (reading is SUPER hard work when you're just a little kid) but I figured this would be a great book to read aloud to him.

It's a pretty thrilling and action-packed book with a lot of cliffhangers at the end of chapters, which might be a little hard if you're only doing a few chapters a night before bed, unless you WANT your little reader sneaking a flashlight under their covers to finish it off late at night.

Lilly, a very ordinary young girl, accompanies her father to work on a bring-your-child-to-work day. He has a boring office job in a boring business in... an abandoned warehouse... making boring... stilts for whales. He treats it, and the mad science laboratories and armed guards, as routine workplace stuff. And his boss, who has a burlap sack over his head and a bucket of brine he douses himself regularly with, is a normal boss who asks his employees if they NEED milk for their coffee or if they'll settle for non dairy creamer, because the milk goes bad so fast. Lilly, being quick on the uptake, soon determines that Larry (her dad's boss) wants to use his whale stilts to put stilts on whales and invade the human world. As one does.

It's a very absurd book.

It also plays gleefully with genre conventions. Lilly's best friend Katie is taken straight out of a middle grade horror series like "Goosebumps" or the Monster Babysitter series I can't remember the name of (she wasn't a baby sitter who was a monster, she was a baby sitter whose charges were monsters). Her other best friend, Jasper Dash is a Tom Swift sort of character, with steam punk tech and his own line of ovaltine-esque drink. Fake ads for both book series (Katie and Jasper each star in their own book series) are included in "Whales on Stilts," and look exactly the way book ads for series looked when I was a kid. You know, the ones you can tear out and use as an order form, back before Amazon existed and Interlibrary Loan was difficult to use, and it could be hard to track down a full series of books or even know when the next one was coming out.

There's a lot going on in this book, some of it subtle and some of it not subtle at all. There's wry humor and slapstick and breaking of the fourth wall. There's stuff kids will get right away, and there's stuff for adults to pick up on. There's also funny footnotes, if you want to train your kid for later Terry Pratchett reading. (there's ALSO fake book club discussion questions in the back that seem more geared to an adult's sense of humor than a child's.)

[Raina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Tongue-in-cheek metafiction for the upper-elementary set.

I took this out as part of my 2015 Summer Reading promotional visits to elementary schools in my school district.
My talk about this book started by asking the crowd of kids to raise their hand if they lived with an adult*. Then, I introduced the idea that many adults have "these things called 'jobs'" that they go to instead of school**. I then asked the kids to raise their hand if they'd ever been to the place where an adult in their household worked. We then described the scene in the book where the main character meets her dad's boss (who is a whale/human hybrid and pours a bucket of seawater on his head in the company breakroom in the scene).

This first book came out in 2005, and Anderson has continued the series with five more adventures (for a total of six books). One problem with promoting NEW fiction in my school visits is that often kids get excited about a series, and then have to WAIT for a sequel. I tried to circumvent this problem this year by promoting a few books which begin already published series.

Anderson writes cerebrally, with many adult-friendly winks to the reader, playing with genre and form and tropes in fiction. Both of the supporting players are heroes in their own book series', and the plot weaves together aspects of early 20th Century futuristic sci-fi, 90s kid-friendly monster-horror, and many other strands of fiction, to tell a new kind of tale.

While I did enjoy listening to this, I would recommend reading the book in print, rather than via audio. I flipped through the printed book after I finished listening, and regretted that I didn't see the illustrated bits and font-play on the page.

I liked Anderson's balance of wackiness, smart humor, and high concept adventure in this series. While I didn't find the characters relatable, people who enjoy language-play, innovative plots, and world-building in their fiction should dig it.


*Totally deadpan - a few of the kids usually started laughing at this point.
**It's very important to me that my book blurbs not assume that every kid in the room lives with their parents, or that all of the adults in their lives are employed outside of the home.

[Amy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm not really familiar with M.T. Anderson's work as a whole; a couple of his more traditionally Young Adult novels have caught my eye from time to time, but Whales on Stilts! is the first book of his that I've actually read through and, I have to say, it did not make me anxious to pick up his other books in a hurry.


It's hard to say where exactly this book goes wrong. One major problem is that, instead of a straightforward story, the author decides to go all post-modern on our assess, featuring characters who are aware that they're characters in a book, book editors who intrude on the action from time to time to provide their (always unhelpful) input, and product placement for things that don't actually exist. Though all of this is presented tongue-in-cheek, the actual story is far too thin to support the weight of all that irony, which crushes the poor reader, leaving him or her slightly-more-than-faintly irritated, with a feeling of "why bother?" about it all, and wondering not only who is the intended audience for this unpleasant hybrid of a story, as the story itself would not probably appeal to anyone older than an 8-11 year-old, but all the savvy self-referentialality could only be appreciated by disaffected teens; but also what happens now that we're all constantly self-aware all the time? What comes after post-modern? Will it come back to old-fashioned story-telling? While I hate to sound like a curmudgeon, I have to say: call me when that happens, as that sounds like something I might enjoy.

[Doc "Andrew Reyes" Rotwang! · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked this up on a whim -- crazy premise, looked wacky, on sale at Half-Price Books.

By the end of the book I had wept, I had felt a nostalgic sense of loss, I had been delighted, I had wept some more and I had a new favorite book.

Such is the power of Whales On Stilts!: ostensibly a facetious YA bundle of yuks, it articulates emotions that are difficult to face within oneself, let alone express to others.

Plus there's a photocopy machine rugged up to work with a donkey. Genius, true genius, moves you in many ways.

[audrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lily believed that the world was a magical place. She believed that if you watched carefully enough, you could find miracles anywhere. The town's baseball team had a secret handshake that went back to the time of the settlers. A professor down the street had a skeleton hanging in his vestibule. Behind the dry cleaner, some ladies held newt races. There were interesting things like this everywhere, waiting to be noticed.

It's basically Eerie, Indiana: The Book and it is GLORIOUS.

[Susan Dunn · Rating 2 out of 5]

Needed to read before I meet MT Anderson at the end of this month, but I actually thought it was kind of stupid (altho I won't tell that opinion to the author!). Captain Underpants fans would probably like it, but that's about it. A mad scientist is equipping whales with stilts and laser beam eyes, so they can walk on land and destroy the humans. Snore...

[Kristen · Rating 3 out of 5]

What an original, offbeat whirlwind of a book! It's funny, but it definitely keeps the reader off-balance with its matter-of-fact weirdness and breakneck pace. I was strongly reminded of Adam Rex's novel Cold Cereal, and also of The Extraordinary Adventures of Ordinary Boy by William Boniface.

[babyhippoface · Rating 4 out of 5]

You have to be in the right mood to get this one: satire, satire, satire. And funny.

And if your boss has blue flippers and wears a potato sack on his head, this can be a real eye-opener.

[K · Rating 5 out of 5]

The first and by far the best of the 3 Thrilling Tales I've read so far.

[Matt Glaviano · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've pretty much stopped adding books I'm reading with the kids to GRs. I wanted to note this one, though, so that I remember this reading of it.

I think this is my third time through this book. I adore M. T. Anderson - his word choice is brilliant and his humor (when applicable) is deadpan and genuinely funny. For some reason, I've still only read the first two books in this series, but always get excited knowing that there are more out there.

Harper and I read this a while back and listened to the second one on a drive to my hometown. When I did the same trip again yesterday - with both my kids this time - it seemed like a great fit, both nostalgic and new.

It was a great choice. Cashman is a great audio narrator and nails the deadpan humor of the text. The word choices are delightful and create some hilarious images. All three of us had a blast listening to it. I do think that some sections are more successful than others - the section where Katie is going around her house and Anderson uses a bunch of suspense cliches to prolong it falls flat - but a little bit of choppiness didn't ruin a really enjoyable short read (listen).

None of that is why I want to note this. Yesterday was the first time I've visited and my hometown felt... small. No nostalgic shine, just humid heat and dust. Distances had shrunk to negligible amounts. Whoever's living in my childhood home is shitty at maintaining landscaping; bushes by the side porch had grown to the point where they were literally blocking the concrete steps. It was, in a word, depressing.

Blah blah blah, you can't go home again, right? I know it's not a new thought. But we got back in the car and started the book again, and almost immediately ran across the chapter in which Lily is talking to her grandmother. Here's what we heard:

"'Everyone wants to get back to the place they know best,' said Lily's grandmother. 'When you are old, though, sometimes that place is not just far away on the map but far away in time. How do you get home, then, when home is in another era?'"

It may not be the most profound thought, but it's well-phrased and caught me at the moment when the passage's emotion was mine. One more moment for which I'll continue to cherish M. T. Anderson. Firefly times indeed.

[Kira Nerys · Rating 5 out of 5]

From the very first sentence, this book states "this is the world of this story and you're going to accept it!" I spent a few chapters incredulously wrapping my head around it. Speaking of, this is how the best friend Katie was introduced:

"Living in Horror Hollow, Katie had had lots of experience with zombies, werewolves, and flesh-eating viruses. She even had her own series of books about her adventures--the Horror Hollow series--and a fan club."

And I'd like to note my favorite chapter title: Whale Control to Major Tom. What an earworm. Anderson obviously understands the serialized thrillers (from the '50s?) he parodies here. Sure, there are good morals about self-confidence and courage, but everything that happens sets up a joke. And this mix of ridiculous yet dastardly captures that science fiction (science fantasy) atmosphere that draws us back to those stories today. It's a send-up to cheese and horror and people making money off of it. Personally, I thoroughly enjoyed this book, especially because it was ridiculous. The end felt a touch abrupt to me--especially since [ ], but it worked regardless. Some jokes felt a bit too repeated by the end (Jasper's inventions, "and now let's go back to . . ."). And we never get a clear explanation of why there are whales on stilts, or why stilts are the best choice, or why people in a city/country like this don't take Lily's warning seriously. But oh well. Whales!

[Andrea · Rating 4 out of 5]

I decided to read this book because I found it on the shelves at the library at work, and it had only been checked out once. I'm looking for some under-read books to recommend to kids. I'm really glad that I picked it up because it was way more humor than I thought it would be.

Lily joins her dad for career day, which happens to be in an abandoned warehouse. He sees nothing wrong with the work that he's doing, but she starts to question everything. When she meets the boss of the company, she finds his blubbery blue hands and his paper bag covered head a bit suspicious. So she gets in contact with her two best friends who happened to have a lot of books written about them [this part was very confusing to me because how did they have books written about them in the 50s when this story was supposed to be set in modern-day?]. the odd Trio set a plan in motion to figure out what's really going on at the abandoned Factory. This book has great drawings and it and I'm glad that we had the actual copy so I could go back and look at it after listening to the audio book. Definitely a sort of ridiculous humor, but I appreciated it and I hope the students will as well!

[Hollowspine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this aloud to my folks, who were amused by this humorous and strange tale. It's all in the title, if the idea of whales on stilts is not funny, it is doubtful any aspect of this delightful novel will interest. However, for fans of the ridiculous, the bizarre and the absurd, this novel will be sure to deliver in all departments.

It also packs some pretty awesome messages about the traits that go into being a good friend and being a hero. The main character thinks of herself as a boringly average person, with no special talents. Her two best friends, however, are heroes. They are constantly saving the world from various evil plots and have fan clubs to boot. When she goes to her father's work place on take your daughter to work day, she realizes that she may have stumbled on an evil plot too, but will she be able to save her dad, an entire city, and the world from the plot of Larry, her dad's boss, who's idea to sell stilts to whales may have an evil, rather than just an improbable, side to it.

Quite funny and quick to read, if you can imitate whale songs and laser beam blasts, all the better to be read aloud.

[Amy Layton · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a humorous, parodic, and pastiche little romp through noir detective novels and child serials such as Goosebumps.  With its use of weirdly, extremely long footnotes, fake advertisements, over-exaggeration, and manners of speaking, this book makes for a funny little ride as Lily discovers that her father's boss is actually a half-human, half-whale hybrid bent on taking over the world.  It should be noted that this book is definitely for middle grade audiences, and the humor likely reflects that as well (I'm an adult so...I can't totally attest for this).  This didn't always hit my funny bone, but it definitely made for some laughs and some snorts.  Also, it's worth noting that in the edition that I read, the cover is purposefully printed the wrong way, so you look as though you're reading it upside down in public. Definitely funny, definitely embarrassing.

Whales on Stilts is definitely worth reading if you like ridiculous plots, strange villains, and really blunt dialogue.  

Review cross-listed here!

[Lee Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

A hilarious parody of old school children's literature, horror stories, parental cluelessness, the publishing industry, etc.

Lily is NOT expecting to discover that her dad works for an evil science laboratory during "take your kid to work" day. Worse, her dad seems clueless that his boss Larry is a half-whale, half-human hybrid intent on creating stilts for whales so that they can invade and destroy humanity with lasers.

It's up to Lily and her two best friends, Jasper Dash, "Boy Technonaut," and Katie Mulligan, the heroine of many "Horror Hollow" tales (both have endless book series based on their exploits), to save the day.

This book is so much fun as an adult--not sure whether kids would enjoy it or not, but they probably would. My favorite part was the "extras" at the end--all of the discussion questions are also part of the tongue-in-cheek humor, and I have a feeling my students would have loved them a little *too* much.

[Ellen · Rating 4 out of 5]

It felt like a snow day might be a good time to see if M. T. Anderson really earned her good name, and on the whole I'd say yes. The book is pretty much exactly what you'd expect from the title, a manic blast of whimsy and wild adventure. It feels a bit like The Series of Unfortunate Events only with less misanthropy and more dime store novel tricks, clearly belonging to the same era that brought you not only the Lemony Snicket books but also quirky independent movie. I would go so far to call this book relentlessly, occasionally tediously quirky. Really, there's nothing to do but surrender to the quirk and try to enjoy it. God knows there's no hope for you otherwise. (So I did.)

[Rebecca · Rating 5 out of 5]

This isn’t the first book in the Pals in Peril series I read. Being the first book, it doesn’t feature as many children’s book parody characters or real exploration of any character other than Lily. But I still love it with the rest of the series.

In this book, Lily the completely normal girl, Kate the monster fighter who probably just stepped out of Goosebumps, and Jasper Dash the pulp sci fi hero from the thirties, have to fight, well, whales on stilts. This book is really funny and I like how it parodies other children’s books. The humor could be off putting for some, but I really liked it as a kid and probably now.