Wild Ride

In a comic misadventure that recalls Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Charley Decker, 12, hopes to get in some quality time with her brother Greg, 18, when their mother heads to Hawaii with her boyfriend Derrick for the week. Instead, Greg and his girlfriend, Marisa Ng, take Derrick’s beloved convertible—a Raven Black 1964 World’s Fair Skyway Mustang—into downtown Chicago, where it is first impounded, then misplaced. To help Greg retrieve the car, Charley enlists her friends: voice of reason Wade Harris, authority-challenging Oona Adair, and ace impersonator Parker Nadel. But finding the Mustang isn’t the end of the road: when they discover a kidnapped man in the trunk, the siblings and their friends are drawn into the evil agenda of a ruthless tech billionaire. Calabrese’s (Connect the Dots) cinematic one-wild-night telling is chaotic and laugh-out-loud funny, but never at the expense of empathy and heart. As the cohort—which largely reads as white, with some names suggesting racial diversity—runs one wild scheme after another to thwart aimless “aggro-bros” and one of the world’s most powerful men, they also strengthen interpersonal bonds and overcome misunderstandings, growing closer to each other. Ages 8–12. Agent: Emily Mitchell, Wernick & Pratt. (Apr.)