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Review - The Thief Lord
Feb. 10th, 2009 02:37 pmWhen I read the translations of Cornelia Funke's books (so the Inkworld books and this...) I feel like there's something missing. It might have got lost in translation or it might not have been there in the first place, but whichever it is, something doesn't feel quite right about this. There are some lovely descriptions and ideas in Cornelia Funke's work, it just somehow doesn't appeal to me. And I know her work is targeted at younger people, but I read plenty of YA lit and it doesn't have this effect.
I felt there was something more lacking about The Thief Lord than about the Inkworld books. I'm pretty sure it's older, but regardless, it's not quite up to that standard. The idea is interesting, but it doesn't seem to quite mesh with the world that she writes about -- at first, for more than the first half of the book even, Venice is entirely as in reality (give or take improbable orphans) with fantastical stories, but reality more or less as we know it. The Magical Roundabout doesn't seem to quite fit in with that for me, even though it does for the characters, because that's full of a kind of magic that I can't see in the rest of the descriptions of Venice.
I love the relationships between some of the characters here, in theory. For example, Bo and Prosper -- there's not much that gets me in fiction more than that kind of brotherly devotion in a relationship. But it just didn't click with me, the characters didn't feel real.
It's a nice enough read, not too heavy, but I guess I just didn't feel a "click" with it. Not quite my thing, maybe.
I felt there was something more lacking about The Thief Lord than about the Inkworld books. I'm pretty sure it's older, but regardless, it's not quite up to that standard. The idea is interesting, but it doesn't seem to quite mesh with the world that she writes about -- at first, for more than the first half of the book even, Venice is entirely as in reality (give or take improbable orphans) with fantastical stories, but reality more or less as we know it. The Magical Roundabout doesn't seem to quite fit in with that for me, even though it does for the characters, because that's full of a kind of magic that I can't see in the rest of the descriptions of Venice.
I love the relationships between some of the characters here, in theory. For example, Bo and Prosper -- there's not much that gets me in fiction more than that kind of brotherly devotion in a relationship. But it just didn't click with me, the characters didn't feel real.
It's a nice enough read, not too heavy, but I guess I just didn't feel a "click" with it. Not quite my thing, maybe.
