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Book Review: Peter and the Starcatchers

Posted by John on January 4th, 2008 at 12:24 am · 5 Comments


by Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson

#1 of 100, folks! Only 99 more to go. I started with an easy one. I promise to pick up a heavy book by someone with a Russian name or a biography of President Bush to balance out this light escapist fantasy.

This is a perfect book for junior high school boys, which is perhaps why I thoroughly enjoyed it (though my sixth grade daughter loves it and its sequels as well). When Pearson’s daughter asked him about the origins of Peter Pan, he somehow roped Barry into writing a three volume collaborative answer.

It’s not for Barrie purists, as this Peter is a bit more mature than the original and the pre-amputation Captain Hook (then known as Black ‘Stache) is much less foppish and 100% menacing.

That said, the book is a fun piratey frolic that kept me up into the wee hours of the morning.

Tags: Book Reviews · Fantasy

5 responses so far ↓

  • 1 Elaine // Jan 4, 2008 at 8:07 am

    Why should junior high school boys get to have all the fun? It sounds like great fun to me. I’ll have to look for that; I’m a long-time Peter Pan fan…and certainly no purist, since I might be the only person in the world who actually loved the film “Hook”. :)

  • 2 Kevin // Jan 4, 2008 at 9:12 am

    When you say that next time you will choose a “heavy” book do you mean one that you could do squats with or one that will throw you into existentialist despair? :)

  • 3 xJane // Jan 4, 2008 at 11:04 am

    Kevin: I think both. Especially when they’re by Russian authors :-p

  • 4 Kevin // Jan 4, 2008 at 1:40 pm

    Unless he chooses the biography of President Bush – where “existential despair” is probably more likely…!

  • 5 John // Jan 4, 2008 at 2:13 pm

    Kevin and xJane caught my pun–I can stave off despair a bit longer! Dostoevsky was on my mind when I wrote this.

    Elaine, I loved Hook as well–I remember my shock when I realized, watching the end credits, that Dustin Hoffman was Captain Hook!

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