Review: Stargirl, by Jerry Spinelli

Everybody could use a friend like Stargirl. She's fun. She's blissfully unaware of social rules. She wants everybody to be happy and doesn't seem too concerned about herself. On one hand she's powerfully charismatic, but on the other hand she's on the outskirts of society. Somebody like her, continuously cheerful and positive, blissfully unaware of social norms, tends to have less friends than not, but those friends she does have are very close. Popularity doesn't concern her. Acting bizarre in public doesn't embarrass her. She's always so full of energy it's as though her crazy behavior fuels her. Reading Jerry Spinelli's Stargirl, it's hard not to fall in love with the title character. And the reader does get to vicariously fall in love with Stargirl through the eyes of the main character, Leo. The results are a fun, fresh story about nonconformity.

As she's the new girl in town, the students at Mica High are unsure what to make of Stargirl. What is clear is that she's something of a sensation. At lunch, on her first day of school, Stargirl plays "Happy Birthday" to a student on her ukelele. She seems to have a supernatural sense about special things such as birthdays and random acts of kindness. A student who picks up a piece of trash from the floor and throws it away will turn around to see Stargiril cheering him on. The student body begins to feel good about itself and looks forward to Stargirl appreciating previously unnoticed gestures of kindness and goodwill. It's not long before she's the most popular girl in the whole school.

What I have described so far make it sound like the story's main character is Stargirl, but that would be wrong. In fact, the story is told in the first person perspective from a student named Leo. Leo directs a school show called Hot Seat, which his friend, Kevin, hosts. On the show, a jury comprised of students asks whoever is on the Hot Seat probing, personal questions, and as soon as Stargirl arrives, it is Kevin's goal to get her on the show. Leo is less certain, however. He feels it might be cruel. The early parts of the story are focused almost primarily on Stargirl, but as the story begins to settle Leo becomes much more important.

The story settles into a sweet romance between Stargirl and Leo. Though he's reluctant at first, Leo falls head over heels for her, and the two go on dates that aren't normal dinner/movie dates, but are a lot of fun nonetheless. The romance that Spinelli writes is among the sweetest romances I have had the pleasure to read. Of course, the romance occurs early enough that you know something is going to happen to threaten it. Not that I mean Stargirl is predictable. What does end up happening seems natural, but certainly not predictable.

For some reason, Stargirl falls in love with Leo. Maybe she can sense a certain kindness to him. Or maybe she liked it when he followed her after school one night to see where she lived. What develops, however, is a sweet, fun romance. None of that dark, murky, games-playing romance seen in Twilight and The Hunger Games. These are two teenagers who fall head-over-heels in love and enjoy each others' company. As with any romance story, this romance faces a conflict - in this case in the form of popularity. Stargirl's popularity in the school lasts only so long. She's a sensation as one of the cheerleaders, but the school soon despises the fact that Stargirl cheers every basket that is scored, including those on the other team. Thus the students begin to shun Stargirl.

Stargirl doesn't seem to notice, but Leo does. What scares Leo is that, as Stargirl's boyfriend, he also feels shunned. He pleads with her to act more normal because the pressure is too much for him. It's something that eats away at him. A question arises in the story as to whether it's more important to be true to your own unique self or to conform to societal norms in order to become accepted by others. A retired archaeologist in the story, and a mentor to many of Mica High's students, Archie provides Leo with one of the novel's key question: "Whose affection do you value more - hers or the others'?" I won't say how the story answers this question, but it is a compelling one, a question with the power to shape a young adult's values. At the core the question is addressing whether you need the affection of a small number of people in order to be happy, or the acceptance of the larger societal group. The older you are, the more obvious the answer to this question is.

I love stories about nonconformity. Nonconformists are important to society. They make life fun, and, besides, everyone of us has a little bit of the nonconformist in us. Stargirl is pure joy to read from beginning to end. Stargirl steals the show, becoming one of the most compelling character in literature. The novel's romance, as well, is lots of fun and serves as an example of how romance stories should be.. The ending, too, I think is perfect and keeps with the flow and design of the story. I was so engrossed I didn't want the story to end, but unfortunately all good stories must come to an end.

Review: Fallen Angels, by Walter Dean Myers

Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers is about a group of black teenagers who enlist in the Vietnam War because they have little to no hope for a good future back home. Vietnam doesn't prove to be a much better option, they soon find out, and they face an experience that, if it doesn't kill them, scars them psychologically for the rest of their lives. Myers wants to make a point that wars are fought by youths, and he does this by convincingly writing from the perspective of a youth. These youths lose their lives, and their sanity, in a chaotic environment, where unseen mines explode or snipers pick them off from a distance. These are kids who are still learning about themselves and the world, and now they face the sad realization that they may not get a chance to experience life in its full.

The novel is told in the first person from the perspective of Richie Perry. Perry leaves his mother and younger brother to join the war effort because he can't stand living on the dangerous streets of New York, and college isn't an option. He briefly befriends a nurse named Judy, but before any love interest sparks up the two are shipped to separate separate parts of the country. However, Perry finds a close companionship with his squad mates, who are also black. His closest friend is Peewee, one of those teens who seems to know everything and really wants to kill some congs, man. He's a prickly fellow and looks for fights with anybody who throws a racial slur his way. Also in the squad are Johnson, a large and quiet young man; Jenkins, the most nervous of the group; Brunner, who is very religious; and Lobel, a lover of movies who comforts himself with the belief he is just living out a movie. Their squad is headed by Simpson, who only has a few months of service left and warns the newcomers not to get him killed.

Fallen Angels begins just before the Tet Offensive, when the U.S. seems convinced the war is almost over. Because of this, Perry and his squad face long moments of tedium, waiting for somewhere to go and something to do. They watch a Julie Andrews movie again and again. Their nightly patrols are their main source of action, but even these turn up nothing. Is there even an enemy out there? The answer is yes. On one patrol they return only to trigger a newly-planted mine. The enemy seems like a ghost. Perry is fired at from the dark, and he fires back into the darkness. Most of the battle sequences are quick and chaotic. They involve a lot of retreating. Myers wants to avoid making battle seem exciting in the fun sense of the term. Any excitement comes from fear. Out in the wild, these young soldiers are vulnerable and there's nothing to protect them.

Perry is a very reflective person. The death of a squad member haunts him for a long time. He also thinks about his other squad mates, his friends and family back home, and the enemy. He wonders what it's like from the perspective of the vietcong, which is only natural. Perry wonders about God. It's clear that he believes, as he often prays to himself, but there is an uneasiness about the mention of God. Brunner is the most open about his belief, and this openness causes friction within the squad. Is this friction due to guilt, or is there a sense that God has failed these young men?

Perry also reflects about race, which is an important theme in the novel. The blacks in the platoon stick together. These blacks feel isolated both at home and in the war. At times they are deliberately placed in the most vulnerable positions of a formation, and they feel a strong sense of injustice. They are afraid some white sergeant will not hesitate risk their lives for a promotion. However, the racism isn't directed at just blacks, but the Vietnamese as well. Every Vietnamese citizen is suspected as a vietcong, and they are referred to derogatorily as congs. There's a sense of distrust even with the South Vietnamese troop, and at one point this manifests itself as a near showdown between them and the Americans. Race seems most striking during times of war or intense conflict. We see this in our post-9/11 world where Muslims and Arabs face discrimination because of the actions of a small group of radicals.


If I have one misgiving, it is that the novel sometimes feels detached from its experience. There is a certain lack of attention to details that would otherwise help the novel feel more life-like. Sometimes the novel feels more like chaotic first-person shooter video game than a realistic war narrative. Some writers have a talent of bringing details to life. Cormac McCarthy is one of the best examples among modern authors. Myers does have talent, though. There are plenty of moments of great power that do bring the experience to life. The novel makes effective use of raw emotion. Men panicking. Men crying. Men in mortal terror of their lives. I cared about Perry and his friend Peewee and wanted them to survive, and when they come into trouble later in the novel I was afraid for them. The fact is, these are just a bunch of kids. They're innocent, and they're suddenly being thrust into one of the worst experiences life has to offer: war.

Review: The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger

I think everybody knows a Holden Caulfield. He seems confident. He has plenty of charms. He likes to pull your leg all the time. The more you get to know him the more you realize he doesn't have his stuff together and probably never will. Holden Caulfield in J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye is only 16, but you can imagine in a few years he'll be jumping from job to job because he just couldn't grow up. This novel is required reading in most high school curricula, and I think the reason for that is to serve as a warning to teenagers preparing to move into the next phase of their life: know the difference between healthy and unhealthy values.

At the start of the story, we learn that Holden Caulfield has been kicked out of Pencey Prep because he failed most of his classes. Holden makes all kinds of excuses. The one that seems to stick is that the whole place is full of phonies. In Holden Caulfield's world there are phonies everywhere. And the mere existence of these so-called phonies is enough to drive Holden to indifference. He grows annoyed when his history teacher, who seems to care about Holden, begins lecturing him about making an effort in life. Holden makes an excuse and gets out of there. In fact, to avoid further humiliation he leaves Pencey that very night, though he still has four days left before the end of the term.

The novel seems made up of random occurrences, what with a run-in with a prostitute and her pimp, visits to bars and clubs, meetings with various friends, but these things happen at the whim of Holden Caulfield. He makes a decision, often unwisely, and then these things happen. Holden does things without purpose. Even the decision to invite the prostitute to his hotel room was not well thought out since he had no intention of sleeping with her. Much of the novel finds him wandering around aimlessly, as though he can't decide what to do, where to go.

His paralysis in making a healthy decision for himself seems to lie in a hypersensitive sense of injustice. Even the tiniest injustice is enough to paralyze him with indecision and inaction. The fact that the world is full of phonies is enough to convince him not to pursue any meaningful activity. He has an ideal of himself as a savior of sorts, but the way he envisions this is as a fantasy rather than a realistic goal. He describes his ideal future as a person who catches lost children as they wander towards the edge of a cliff. Humanity needs him, he seems to believe, to protect them from the error of their ways. But this vision only serves to highlight his inability to make a concrete decision about the direction he wants to take his life. Holden doesn't even realize he's one of those children veering towards the edge of the cliff. If the ending is any indication, he never will.

Review: The Giver, by Lois Lowry

Lois Lowry slowly and steadily builds up to the startling revelations in The Giver that adult readers know are there, but will take younger readers by surprise. One can't help but feel a sense of unease when reading about a utopian society: what they offer comes at a great cost to the individual. While the individuals in The Giver live a life free from bad things such as physical and emotional pain, it comes at a cost of their freedom to choose, their freedom to feel. Of course, the citizens have no idea what they are missing; they have been trained to have such a precise vocabulary that extremes don't exist. When the main character, Jonas, says he is starving, his elders correct him. He can never starve, because food is always provided for him, but he can be hungry. On the surface this sounds like a wonderful place to live, however Lowry demonstrates that in order to live in a world with the greatest amount of good, there must also be evil.

Jonas has grown up with the same childhood as every other child in his town. At the age of one he was named and given to both of his parents, and every year after that he achieved a new milestone: at age nine he receives a bike and at age twelve he is assigned a job for adulthood. Beyond that, he foresees being assigned a spouse, being assigned a couple of kids, moving on to the center for Childless Adults and then the House of the Old, before being "released." It's a safe life, and nobody seems to question it. They are trained not to be "rude," which means asking the types of questions that would dig at the essence of their life. They are also trained to share their "feelings" with their family, so all feelings can be analyzed and reduced to nothing.

All of these details are laid out in a nice, steady fashion, providing a nice picture into the small community Jonas and his family reside. Then when everyone is comfortable, something interesting happens. Jonas's nice future vision for himself unravels when he is selected (not assigned) for a job of high honor. This job is the most important there is, because it ensures the peace of the community: The Receiver of Memories. This Receiver holds memories of intense pain, as well as memories of love, but they are memories meant for the Receiver only. Thus these memories, transferred to him through the Giver, provide Jonas with a new perspective on his life and the world he lives in. While Jonas is at first excited by the wonderful memories transferred to him, he quickly realizes the horror of living the life of the Receiver. Not only does he hold all of the nice memories of the world, but he also holds the most terrible memories of the world.

The Giver, like 1984 before it, focuses on the importance of language to control a community. Words can only take on meaning if we have learned or experienced that meaning. When the Giver first tells Jonas about snow, Jonas is confused because he has never heard of nor experienced snow. Jonas, after experiencing the memory of snow, cannot then tell of his experience to the community because the word, and the thing, does not exist in their memories. Similarly, color does not exist, and so there is no concept of red or green or yellow or white and so on. Even in their feelings, the people of the community are trained to know only the less severe of feelings. When Jonas feels that he is frightened, it sounds wrong to him until he realizes it isn't fear he feels, but anxiety. Fear, like starvation, can't exist in a world where terrible things can't happen.

Also similar to Orwell's concerns of totalitarian communism, Lowry has concerns about societal "sameness." This sameness is what creates the most secure world, as it's only in differences that danger lies. Citizens aren't allowed much in the way of personalities. Of course, the system does account for those inevitable differences that people have. People are tracked into certain jobs based on their unique traits. But to call these differences personalities might be a stretch. It's difficult to have a personality when you're not allowed to lie, for example, or when you must robotically accept every apology thrown at you (and those are quite frequent). The ideal society that Lowry sees is colorless and consists of a nuclear family of a mother, a father, and two children. Think of the scenes from Edward Scissorhands where all houses look the same and everyone leaves for work at the same time. The sameness Lowry fears is not something in a communist nightmare, but a modern, capitalist society. She asks, how far is a society that's not allowed to think for itself willing to go to protect its perceived sense of security?

Review: A Mercy, by Toni Morrison (2008)

In A Mercy, Toni Morrison tells a story about early America when slaves weren't yet the only source of free labor. In this setting, there is a wildness about life, and man attempts to tame this wildness with civilization and religion. Morrison depicts this world with realism and strong attention to detail. That Morrison chose to set her story in 1690 is an interesting decision because at that time slavery was only beginning to be defined by race. Here a free black man could have higher status than an indentured white man, though lowest of all were the women, particularly non-white women. According to the book jacket, this story is about how one act of mercy has unintended consequences, but I believe that's a misstatement of Morrison's point. I believe the point is that people of an inferior station in life are doomed by society to live a troubled life no matter what chance an act of mercy might grant them for a better one.

Central to the characters and their connections with one another is Jacob Vaark, a white farmer in Maryland who seeks help and greater wealth. In the process he gathers the women and labor who compose this story. He marries Rebekka, a young white woman whose father would marry her off to the first man to offer. Jacob and Rebekka are grateful for one another, as Jacob is kind and Rebekka is obedient yet independent. They build themselves a small home in a remote area, but life is difficult and Rebekka loses every child she births. Jacob eventually brings home help in the form of Lina, a Native-American woman who has witnessed her tribe decimated by smallpox. She is distrustful of others, but gradually befriends Rebekka. There is also Sorrow, a scatter-brained woman who seems simple, though her troubles are far more complex than we realize once we get to know them. Finally, there is the main character, Florens, a young girl whose mother gives her to Jacob as a form of mercy, to keep the girl from the lustful cravings of her master. Florens is just a child and she is quickly the object of affection from both Lina and Rebekka.

There are other men as well who are key to the story. Willard and Scully are indentured servants who occasionally help the Vaarks out. Scully, the youngest of the two, is hopeful his servitude will be as brief as possible, and he does his best to avoid the mistakes of his friend, Willard, whose fugitive and thieving ways have been cause to increase the length of his servitude. These two are somewhat jealous by the free black man, a blacksmith hired by Jacob to build a gate for the new house he wants, but they are all good friends anyway because of the smith's charming ways. Lina is the most troubled by this blacksmith's appearance once she realizes Florens has grown smitten with him. For Lina, men are always trouble. The blacksmith is a curious character in many ways, and the fact he is a free black man is a shock to the servants. They find it strange the way he and Jacob talk with one another as though equals. I also find it curious that the blacksmith is among the only characters who doesn't have a name. It makes him enigmatic, but it also strips away the power his freedom grants him.

The plot is simple, but the humanity is much more complex. Conflict revolves around a deadly disease, smallpox, that knows no bounds between the highly and the lowly among people. The conflict is also internal, within each character, and as the story unfolds the reader gets to know each character, their desires and troubles, in a lot of detail, though in the process I think Morrison's storytelling suffers somewhat. She's certainly a gifted writer, as she's shown in her other works like Beloved and The Bluest Eye, but here her writing sometimes comes off as stilted at times. Too much is learned through expository background information, which slows the story down. Every time Morrison introduces a new perspective, she also provides their life story, and that's quite a bit of characters. I've also read people criticize her character development, though I'm not sure I agree. Morrison's goal, anyway, is not the type of character development people may be used to in YA fiction, but to show the carnal human desires and fears that shape their decisions.

I believe at the heart of these desires is one for security. Rebekka realizes as a woman in her standing she has a choice between marriage, servitude, and prostitution, and neither option is terribly appealing. She chooses marriage because at least there you have the chance at a good husband and some semblance of social standing. The other servant women, Lina, Sorrow, and Florens, also feel the comfort Jacob's security brings. Jacob is a rare man who does not mistreat the women or servants in his life. There is no threat of abuse, physically or emotionally. With Jacob, on his property, under his wealth, the women feel safe. However, smallpox tears this security apart. Even for Rebekka, society demands that her widowhood doesn't last forever, and the servants all realize that marriage means a new man and another roll of the dice.

Love is also important, though there is a safe love and a dangerous love. The love story is between Florens and the blacksmith, with Lina constantly warning Florens against the man. Put this story in the hands of Stephenie Meier, and we'd have another teen romance story where a boy and a girl are so madly in love they destroy themselves. Morrison, however, does not see this type of relationship as a positive. The positive role models for love are Rebekka and Jacob, who have created a powerful family environment. The love Florens has for the blacksmith is dangerous because it goes forward heedlessly in a time and environment where caution is the best chance for survival.

Something that strongly lent a strong sense of security in these harsh times was religion. Jacob and Rebecca have no interest in religion, because the community it builds is sometimes hateful and frightening, but religion affects everyone's lives nonetheless. The church had a lot of power, but it also abused that power by alienating those who chose not to believe, or didn't belong, and it defined who was or was not considered worthy under God's eyes. A strong feeling that God exists also spawned a superstitious fear of evil beings. In one scene a young girl is thought to be a demon because she has a lazy eye, and her mother cuts her legs open to bleed her because demons don't bleed. Morrison makes an interesting observation about God and the devout through her character, Sorrow. After enduring a long illness, Rebekka gets down on her knees and prays to God. She gives thanks to God rather than the servants who devoted their time and effort to keep her alive, and to Sorrow it's as though the devotion shown by her servants meant nothing to her. This serves to raise questions about how God views those who devote themselves to Him.

As a piece of historical fiction that hones its observations on a single family in 1690s Maryland, this is a very fascinating read. Morrison obviously knows her stuff, and she brings the era to life in great detail. Thematically there's a lot going for the novel, and I'm sure a second reading would help me find more that I missed during the first read. This is a book I would recommend, though it's not Morrison at her best. She's a challenging author, and her words provide challenges here, but too often the story delves into expository background her characters. Morrison is interested in the meek and the oppressed, but more than that she is interested in humanity, because in the end everyone is slave to folly and mortality, anyway.

Guest Post: Goodnight, Brian by Steven Manchester (New Release)

Steven Manchester has just released a brand new book called Goodnight, Brian. If you like what you see here, make sure to pick up a copy. 


Brief Synopsis:
Fate was working against little Brian Mauretti. The food that was meant to nourish him was poisoning him instead, and the doctors said the damage was devastating and absolute. Fate had written off Brian. But fate didn’t count on a woman as determined as Brian’s grandmother, Angela DiMartino – who everyone knew as Mama. Loving her grandson with everything she had, Mama endeavored to battle fate. Fate had no idea what it was in for.

An emotional tale about the strength of family bonds, unconditional love, and the perseverance to do our best with the challenging gifts we receive, Goodnight, Brian is an uplifting tribute to what happens when giving up is not an option.

 

Author Bio:  Steven Manchester is the published author of the #1 best seller, Twelve Months, as well as A Christmas Wish (the holiday prequel to Goodnight, Brian). He is also the Pressed Pennies, The Unexpected Storm: The Gulf War Legacy and Jacob Evans, as well as several books under the pseudonym, Steven Herberts. His work has appeared on NBC's Today Show, CBS's The Early Show, CNN’s American Morning and BET’s Nightly News. Recently, three of his short stories were selected "101 Best" for Chicken Soup for the Soul series.

steven.h.manchester@sunlife.com
http://www.StevenManchester.com
http://www.facebook.com/#!/AuthorStevenManchester

Paperback & Kindle: http://www.amazon.com/Goodnight-Brian-ebook/dp/B00A6DBE10/ref=sr_1_sc_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1353860480&sr=1-1-spell&keywords=goodbight+brian+manchester
Nook: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/goodnight-brian-steven-manchester/1113610286?ean=9781611880618 


 

Goodnight, Brian

(brief excerpt)

Enough time had passed for the shock of Brian’s condition to wear off. Joan had stumbled beyond the grieving process and had given up negotiating with God. She was now at a place called rage. Mama sat with her daughter at the kitchen table, trying to help her make sense of it all. “Maybe Brian’s a test from God?” Mama suggested.

“Why would God test a little baby who’s never done a thing wrong? Why would He test an innocent child?” Joan snapped back.

Mama shook her head. “I didn’t say God was testing Brian,” she said evenly. There was a thoughtful pause. “Maybe He’s testing everyone around Brian?”

“I don’t want to hear that!” Joan roared. “My son will never be able to enjoy the life of other people who don’t…”

Mama slapped her hand on the Formica table, stopping Joan in mid-sentence and turning her face into that of a seven-year-old girl’s. “Not another negative word, do you hear me?” she yelled back, quickly grabbing her daughter’s hands and holding them tightly. “Positive, Joan—everything must be positive! Negative calls for negative and positive brings forth positive. Brian’s already facing some unfair challenges. We have to be positive, Joan. We just have to be!”

Joan wiped her eyes. “But what if the doctor’s right, Ma?” she muttered in a tortured voice. “What if…”

Without letting Joan’s hands go, Mama took a deep breath and started in on her own tirade. “The doctors don’t know what the hell they’re talking about! I had a grandmother who lived her whole life as a brittle diabetic, but she ate anything she wanted. She died three days before her eighty-fifth birthday. Your grandfather supposedly had cirrhosis of the liver, but lived with his bottle for forty more years until old age took him. They don’t know beans! Besides, we need to have faith in a higher source.” She pulled her crucifix away from her neck and kissed it. “You have to believe, Joan. Before any of the healing can take place, you have to believe that it will.” She nodded and lowered her tone. “Only God knows how…and that’s enough.”

Joan placed her face in her hands and began to cry. She was now completely removed from her rage and safely returned to the stage of grief. “I’m…just…so… scared,” she stuttered, sobbing.

Mama stroked her hair. “Don’t you worry, love. They say that children are raised by a village.” She nodded her gray, curly head. “I think it’s about time we had a village meeting.”

Review: Inkheart, by Cornelia Funke (2003)

Cornelia Funke's massive fantasy story has very little charm and substance after you get passed the first 100 pages or so. I was enthralled by the beginning one-fifth of the story, about a young girl who grows up in a paradise of books. Funke does such a great job of creating a sense of mystery and awe early on that it's a big disappointment how the rest of the story turns out. Once the reader learns what the story is really about, it grows very dull. The colorful characters lose their glimmer, and much of the story is populated by flavorless, witless villains who merely brandish knives and cold gazes. Funke follows the trend of recent YA fantasy that prefers a dark story to a light-hearted one. It took the Harry Potter series several books to finally cave in to its dark urges, but Inkheart switches over in the matter of 100 pages, and from that point on I felt like I was trudging along rather than enjoying myself.

The main character is a young girl named Meggie. She lives with her father, Mo, who fixes up book covers and keeps old books from falling apart. He is a lover of stories, and this trait has been passed down to his daughter. Very little is known about her mother except that she went away mysteriously when Meggie was only very young. Meggie and her father appear to be living a fine little life until the arrival of a mysterious figure named Dustfinger, who calls Meggie's father by the name of Silvertongue. It seems that Mo has been hiding some secrets from her, and Meggie spies on her father to try to learn what they are. These secrets revolve around a book and a special power of Mo's, which is the basis for the novel's fantasy elements.

An evil being named Capricorn has been seeking Mo for a very long time, and now Dustfinger is trying to convince Mo to go and see him. It's not very clear what side Dustfinger is on. He takes a liking to Meggie, and shows her tricks he can do with fire and introduces her to his horned marten, Gwin. However, he also has a sneaky, suspicious look about him. His motives are selfish above all else. Mo decides he and Meggie need to run away and hide, and they set out for her great aunt Elinor's house. Dustfinger joins them, against Mo's better judgment. Elinor is the most enjoyable character, at least at the start. She dislikes children, and this creates for some colorful, humorous dialogue at the start. She also loves books, perhaps even more than Mo. She collects them and has a gigantic collection in her house. Eventually the villains make their entrance, and this is where things begin to go downhill.

One of the problems is that nobody seems to take the danger in the novel very seriously, and as a result it's difficult for the reader to take it seriously either. When Mo is kidnapped forcefully by Capricorn's men, it never occurs to even the elderly Elinor to call the police. Instead, everybody packs up and heads out to find him, convinced a simple discussion will win him back. All of the characters in the novel have a tendency to behave like naive children. It's as though they don't realize there are bad things in the world. They talk when they should probably keep their mouth shut, but in truth the villains hardly do anything villainous at all except make threats, hold knives to throats, and throw people into prisons. The reader is supposed to take the narrator at her word when she says that Capricorn is a very evil dude. Funke forgets that it's more powerful to show than to tell.

The novel is very long and it feels even longer because it is repetitive and predictable. The problem with the story is that it has nowhere to go, and Funke merely prolongs the inevitable by showing us many different perspectives and introducing several new characters. In the process, Meggie takes a backseat to everyone else; she is merely pulled along and doesn't truly make a decision of her own. Nothing about the story is very convincing, and the ending comes together too nicely. The reader doesn't really have any reason to be afraid, nor does the reader have any reason to invest anything emotionally into the story. It's flat, dull, and lifeless. Such a shame, too, because it opened up with such promise.