Book Reviews

Review by Eminiann

Conor Broekhart was born flying. Literally. This story begins with Conor's extraordinary birth and whisks you away to the Kingdom of Saltee where right is Great Saltee and wrong is Little Saltee. Conor's life is perfect until he gets caught up in a plot of treason and is whisked away from his life of happiness and is forced to use his wits and fencing capabilities just to survive. Fencing is not his passion however, to survive this torture he must fly away, whether it be in his mind or literally and become the Airman.

Artemis Fowl is your typical 12 year old millionaire who just so happens to be a criminal mastermind.  When he discovers a whole new civilization of elves and magic he decides to kidnap an elf and exchange it for ransom money.  Suddenly, Artemis finds himself engaged in an adventure of action and comedy as he battles with wits and for his life.  Though this book does have a slow start the series is an epic story that will take you and your imagination into another world!

I tried reading this book a few years ago and could not get through it.  I have a hard time enjoying a story if I don't like any of the characters.

Recently a friend told me to read it.  I tried again.

Normally I'm not into modern evil faerie books.  The sub-genre as a whole does not appeal to me.  I read it anyway.

Thankfully, Artemis Fowl did not read like The Purple Emperor or a Holly Black.  The Novel unfolded more like Oceans Eleven.  Eowin Colfer is smart.  It unfolds in details of the plans of various characters from various viewpoints meshing to form the novel.  Also, I like Irish fantasy, has a very distinct flavor. 

Of course the title character and main protagonist is an evil boy genius.  But the second protagonist is Holly Short, a LEPrecon(high-tech fairy police) captain.  Holly is a good character.  And this time around I liked Holly and most of the victims . . . ah, fairies--Julius Root, Trouble Kelp, and Foaly for example.

Artemis Fowl is a very well-thought out book.  It is original.  It is entertaining.  Does it achieve greatness?    No.  But it does pretty well.  Eowin Colfer is annoyingly environmentalist and a bit of a pacifist.  Some characters are underdeveloped.  But it is about as good as you can get with a villain as the protagonist. 

In the end, this is a decent book.  Maybe hard for some to read.  But Eowin Colfer seems like someone you can trust.  You know what to expect in his writing.  Nothing overly gory, a minimum amount of bad language, nothing objectionable.  And something that is smart, entertaining, and familiar.  If I have nothing else to read I can pick up something by Eoin Colfer.  It won't make it on to my shelf (which has limited space); but I will read it--and enjoy it.