Pluto Gets the Call by Adam Rex (review)

Rex, Adam Pluto Gets the Call; illus. by Laurie Keller. Beach Lane/Simon, 2019 [48p] Trade ed. ISBN 978-1-5344-1453-2 $17.99 E-book ed. ISBN 978-1-5344-1454-9 $10.99 Reviewed from galleys Ad 4-7 yrs

Pluto is just welcoming a visitor for a tour around the solar system when his cell rings ("Sorry. I should take this"), and it's a team of Earth scientists informing him he's no longer a planet. Pluto then struggles to keep his emotions in check as he squires his visitor around the other planets, breaking the news about his demotion along the way. There's a smattering of confusion and sympathy from planets still in the club; Mars has issues with those robots Earth has sent to crawl around her, and space debris in the asteroid belt explodes with schadenfreude over the downward reclassification. Sun finally puts things into perspective by reminding Pluto he's been orbiting "for billions of years before the word 'planet' was even invented," and he'll now be beloved by underdogs everywhere. The expected mini-lessons on each planet's main feature are present and accounted for, and a closing spread packs in more factoids. This is, at heart, a replay of the Pluto story that broke well over a decade ago, made slightly more confusing by the opening scene that suggests Rex's contemporary audience is there as the little guy learns the bad news; it's therefore more jokey than impactful, and the art sometimes goes for garish busyness over clarity. Still, the comic commentary from space objects, a closing author note, and Keller's expressive "traditional, digital, and galactic media" collages humorously and effectively recap the scientific kerfuffle.