Top positive review
4.0 out of 5 starsFantastical and fantastic!
Reviewed in the United States on May 1, 2015
I enjoyed this book very much. It is full of fantastical beings and events that interface with everyday modern people. That interface is the most compelling underlying motivation of the story, of course. I also like the fact that the main child character is female for a change. Yea!
The book is also, in a sense, all about books, and I love books about books. If you have a fairly good knowledge of classic children's literature, you'll enjoy those connections immensely. If you like books, particularly children's books, and you like fantasy and adventure, you will probably enjoy this book.
Quotations are used from many other children's and fantasy books. Those make the story even more enjoyable.
The writing is creative and interesting, the plot is fantastical and convoluted, the characters are varied and mostly interesting, sometimes likable and sometimes detestable, of course. Some characters aren't clearly good guys or bad guys, which is similar to life as we know it.
On the down side, which is minor, I am wondering just who this book was written for. I'm told it's children's literature. But children do not need to read about this much violence, surely, even when it is committed mostly by beings from books rather than reality? I don't know. I also find some plot twists to be very unbelievable, but it is a fantasy, after all.
I read this book on the Kindle (as I read most books) and only noticed one potential typo in the book (which is amazingly good, really).
