The Child Thief

I had started reading David Eddings's Queen of Sorcery when I wandered into Chapters a few days ago, which was my first mistake. While browsing the shelves, I discovered that Brom (a fantastic artist I know of from Magic:the Gathering) had written a novel. The art looked fantastic, and the book's premise intrigued me. That was when I made my second mistake: I started reading the Prologue. After that, I found myself unable to put the book down and immediately bought it.

The Child Thief is the story of Peter Pan reimagined. Peter roams the streets of New York looking for lost children who he brings back to his magic island. He entices them with stories of adventure and the lack of grownups, but leaves out the scarier aspects, like the Flesh-eaters and barghest, or the Mist that must be crossed to get to the island. Once in Avalon, the children become his troops in a war for the island's very soul. One of these lost children is Nick. Peter helps Nick get away from his troubles; with no where left to turn, Nick follows Peter through the Mist to Avalon. Once there, Nick finds he does not want to be part of the war, but is caught up in it all the same.

One of my favourite characters was, surprisingly, the Captain. Gone is Captain Hook, the usual villain in Peter Pan. In his place is a very deep, brave character who I truly felt sorry for. He was a man left in extraordinary circumstances and I felt myself feeling sorry for him and hoping that things would work out.

Make no mistake, The Child Thief is a very dark, adult tale. But it was very beautiful in its way, and I found myself not wanting to put it down. Brom spun a fantastic story, and I hope to get a hold of more by him in the future!

Pawn of Prophecy

A few years back, I got a hold of all five books in David Eddings' Belgariad. I decided to give the series a try last week. I have read one of his other series in the past, and enjoyed it, so I was hoping that the Belgariad would also be enjoyable.

Unfortunately, I've had a real struggle with the first book, Pawn of Prophecy. Pawn of Prophecy follows Garion, a young boy raised by his Aunt Pol on a farm. Unfortunately, Garion gets caught up in world shattering events when his friend, Mister Wolf, comes to the farm in desperate need of Pol's help. And so Garion is dragged from the farm life he knows into the company of kings as they attempt to find an important object that was stolen.

I didn't like that the book followed Garion. While he was an alright character, everyone treats him as a child throughout the entire book. No matter what he does, he is looked down upon by his Aunt. And even though he is quite obviously in the middle of things, and has a right to know why he was uprooted from his life, no one wants to tell him anything. I also found the beginning of the book threw a lot of information at you that was hard to follow or care about (especially when it then heads to a simple farm for a good quarter of the book), and lots of things were extremely predictable. This last thing, especially concerning certain characters like Aunt Pol was most likely done on purpose, but I thought the book would have been better if things were concealed a bit better for the reader.

As I struggled through it, I kept thinking that I would not attempt any of the other books in the Belgariad. Pawn of Prophecy was one of those mediocre books. Like Tim Lebbon's Fallen, it wasn't a good book and it wasn't a bad book. But unlike Fallen, Pawn of Prophecy didn't really keep me wanting to read it. I made it through by sheer stubbornness (or maybe stupidity) alone. I never really found myself interested in what was going on through the majority of the book. Only at the end did something interesting happen, but I'm not sure it was enough to make me want to read the next book. Knowing me, I probably will; I'm hoping that the Belgariad will get better as it goes.