Book Review: Fly by Night
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What Parents Should Know
Parents need to know that there's some violence, though not
terribly graphic. For much of the book, the main character's
ethics are questionable at best, though she does shape up
toward the end.
Families can talk about the complex plot. What are all the
different guilds, and why are they fighting? Were the
Birdcatchers good or bad? What about Eponymous Clent? Mr.
Kohlrabi? What does Mosca guess wrong and what does she get
right?
It's hard to know what category to put this in. We've listed it as a Fantasy because it seems like one, until you realize that there is no magic, wizards, strange creatures, or any of the other usual trappings of fantasy. You could call it Historical Fiction, since it does take place in the past -- just not any past that has ever actually existed.
Of first-time author Frances Hardringe's fertile imagination there can be no doubt: The book is filled with an abundance of complex, deeply thought-out, and at times just plain weird events and characters. Of her love of, and facility with, the English language there can also be no doubt, and word-loving children will find much here to tickle their fancies.
But Hardringe falls prey to that perennial bugaboo of novice writers -- she tries to pack everything she has thought of into her first book, and apparently she didn't have an editor who told her to scale it back. The result is a mishmash that will lose many, if not most, young readers early on, either to boredom, confusion, or (if they haven't been spending their free time reading the dictionary) incomprehension.
This is more than a diamond in the rough, though. There's tremendous talent here, shown in many real gems of originality and felicitous language. Let's hope that for her next book Hardringe gets an editor who will rein her in a bit more sharply.
Frances Hardringe's fertile imagination fills this book with an abundance of complex, deeply thought-out, and at times just plain weird events and characters. Word-loving children will find much here to tickle their fancies.
But Hardringe falls prey to that familiar bugaboo of novice writers -- she tries to pack all her ideas into her first book, and apparently she didn't have an editor who told her to scale it back. The result is a mishmash that will lose many, if not most, young readers early on to boredom, confusion, or incomprehension. But there's tremendous talent here, shown in many real gems of originality and felicitous language. Let's hope that Hardringe gets an editor who will rein her in more sharply next time.
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