Q1BM. Book Review – Artemis Fowl [ & series]

   Book Review – Artemis Fowl (series)

KaBoni Bailey

Author: Eion Colfier

            There so often comes a book series that you can glue your eyes to and read over and over again. In my experience of the many books I’ve read, the Artemis Fowl books are definitely on my top ten lists of best book series. Given the witty banter, high intelligence and focus that this book emits; it’s simple to say, ‘give it a read’. Weather it’s from the point of Artemis’s Butler, who happens to be one of the worlds most dangerous bodyguards, or from Captain Holly Short’s (A fairy who trifles with Artemis and his schemes) point of view, you will always get a great third-person understanding of the story. As well, Eion Colfier’s style changes depending on the main character of the chapter/section; when using Butler as his center piece, he tends to be more aggressive and specified on action, when on the other hand, writing about Artemis’ situations seems to be more theological and intrusive to the mind. It leaves you questioning his intentions and wanting to read to the next page.

 Adults will even fall captive to the fictional inclusion of Fairies and their battle to remain hidden from the Mud Men (Humans). Taking it from there, the story all begins when a teenage kid decides to kidnap a fairy for buttloads of gold in order to fund an expedition to find his father, who has been missing for several years. Some would compare this book to The arm, the eye and the ear by (Search author), or The amulet of Samarkand by (Search book/author [Nathaniel]); both of these books presents a writing style not generally known and/or understood by people who read regular book after regular book.

D’arvit!, a expression that the fairies use to designate a censored cuss word. Eion Colfier uses this word perfectly, as no one knows what it means in mud men language, yet we, the readers, know that it is bad enough word to not be deciphered by the readers. Showing up more than several times in Artemis Fowl, in stressful situations, this word is one that is used precise enough to give the hint, something big is going on, or is about to happen.

It may seem as though this book is prefect and would eliminate every other book made, but like all books, there are some flaws. Because these books are so intellectually simple yet complex, there may be the need to re-read pages, even chapters to understand a specific action and/or concept in the book. When I first read the books, multiple times I had to go back and re-read up to two chapters of what I previously read to understand the parts of the climax. Along with that, small details that most wouldn’t pay attention to are very important for a majority of the books. Seeing as though Artemis is a mentalist and likes to toy with his unknown subjects, it is somewhat understandable that his books makes the reader go deeper into their frontal lobe for comprehension, but sometimes, if not most times it is unnecessary to confuse your reader to the point of frustration (I’ve been their before).

As you can tell, these books have their ups and downs, more ups than downs but some downs non-the less. Which is expected of any author, for an author with no errors isn’t an author at all.

Eion Colfier, the author of the bestselling Artemis Fowl series published book number one on April first, 2003; which slowly but surely became his best seller. This 316 page paperback anthology is still, in 2013, a force to be reckoned with. Considering the mix of genre’s that reside in the book, ranging from Sci-fi to young adult to fantasy, Artemis fowl has many features that leave it impeccable to the publication world and young minds alike. Yet, as well with anything else in this world, it’s not a perfect piece of writing, but everything that you expect in a good book is present in Artemis fowl; cleverness, strategy, action and great emotion. Whatever flaws may be present in this book, it still does not affect the overall theme of the book and objective: to give the reader a good read.