Un Lun Dun & Kid's Fantasy

[ShannonA]

I finished China Mieville's Un Lun Dun last week. It's his children's fantasy book, and it lies somewhere between The Wizard of Oz and MirrorMask, except in a strange, modern mirror-image of London.

The world design is top-notch, with Mieville really carrying off a world creation that I found interesting, colorful, and evocative. Part of this is the fact that Un Lun Dun is the place that cast-off things go, but part of it is just a weird inventiveness, from buses floating on balloons to (I kid you not) garbage-can ninjas. They're called binjas you see, which is funnier in British idiom.

Despite this sort of inventiveness, I have yet to find a kid's book of this sort that's really filled me with a sense of wonder. Maybe I'm just too old. I dunno; I hope not. This one I felt was a bit slow, with the hundred (brief) chapters being a bit more than I thought the book needed.

I felt similarly let down by Coraline and MirrorMask in recent years, which also had neat visuals but not enough substance. Maybe that's just the definition of a kid's fantasy, and it's not enough to fulfill any more.

Nonetheless, a neat book that was worth reading.

[Joebot]

I felt similarly let down by Coraline and MirrorMask in recent years, which also had neat visuals but not enough substance. Maybe that's just the definition of a kid's fantasy, and it's not enough to fulfill any more.

Nonetheless, a neat book that was worth reading.


Sucks to get old, huh?

I haven't read "Un Lun Dun," but it's high on my list. I liked "Coraline" a lot (and my 10-year old daughter LOVED it). I'm scared to death of buttons now.

There's some terrific young adult fantasy out there these days, but a lot of it seems like tired retreads (cough*Eragon*cough) or Harry Potter knock-offs. A couple of books that I would suggest are Jeff Smith's "Bone" graphic novels (currently being released in beautiful color versions) and Philip Pullman's "Golden Compass" (the sequels are a wee bit of a letdown).

I've also heard good things about Cornelia Funke and Garth Nix, but haven't tried either one.

[Olive]

I'm utterly uninterested in kid's books, except for how they relate to my kid. So I'm sure in about 3 years time I'll start showing up on boards for suggestions to read to a 4 year old boy, but for now I just want another Bas Lag book!

[The23SidedDie]

I don't remember the Lloyd Alexander books I read being particularly trivial, but...it's also been a while since I read them. Hrm.