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Book Review: The Amulet of Samarkand
I finished The Amulet of Samarkand by Jonathan Stroud recently and to be honest I was a bit disappointed. I've heard good things about this book. Plus it's a New York Times Bestseller, but then, I find that a lot of the things on that list don't live up to the hype.
TAoS is about Nathanial whose parents sell him into apprenticeship to a weak and stupid magician by the name of Underwood. In Stroud's world, London (and the world in general) is and has always been ruled by magicians, so young Nathanial is destined to become part of the elite. But at the tender age of 11 he is humiliated by one Simon Lovelace at a party hosted by his master. From then on Nathanial is consumed by a childish desire for revenge and by 12 he's studied enough to summon a several thousand year old djinn by the name of Bartimaeus to steal a powerful amulet from Lovelace.
Of course these things never go as planned and Nathanial ends up in a lot of hot water as he's drawn into a world of intrigue and murder that he had no idea existed. Some of actions have dire, permanent consequences, which was refreshing to see in a children's book.
But I had a huge problem with this book. It had two points of view. (That's not the part I had a problem with, I'm getting there) One being an odd mix of third person-first person told from Bartimaeus' PoV, and the other from Nathanial's PoV. Bartimaeus' voice is droll, a little bit sarcastic, and very cynical. There is at least one footnote per page, often more, delivering some sort of explanation or droll aside. It was funny at first, then it got old and annoying. The problem though, is that neither character is relatable. I spent the entire book waiting to fall in love with the characters, or to be taken in by the fascinating dynamics of their relationship. But it didn't happen.
I hated Nathanial with a passion with the whole way through. Stroud wrote Nathanial as a boy who has very little empathy. He's cold and removed because he grew up in an emotionally abusive household with no friends. It worked too well though, Nathanial alienates the reader over and over. It's not that he's a bad person. I love having immoral characters in my books. They are often my favorites. But this kid is the perfect combination of self-importance, incompetence, and tantrums to turn the reader off. He's not endearing. He's not even good at being self-obsessed.
Bartimaeus on the other hand turned me off because his narrative was so detached. Stroud tries to be witty, perhaps pull in a bit of Terry Pratchett, but Pratchett is famous because few can do what he does. Bartimaeus' voice falls flat more often than it doesn't. Plus, Stroud does a good job of showing us that Bartimaeus is. not. human. He doesn't think like us, he doesn't like us, and he wants nothing to do with us. Stroud does such a good job that it was almost impossible for me to become emotionally attached.
On the other hand, if you are a plotty person (which I'm not usually), then you'll probably enjoy this book. It's brimming with plot (though sometimes Bartimaeus waxes poetic about how he sneaks into places for just a bit too long) and Stroud even manages to pull a couple of surprises, hard to do with the jaded reader. My one complaint was that the ending could have been a bit tighter. It's not bad, it just drags on a bit. Cut about 50-75 pages and it would have made it snappy in just the right way. Though I think part of the reason it dragged on was that Stroud was setting up the next book.
TAoS is about Nathanial whose parents sell him into apprenticeship to a weak and stupid magician by the name of Underwood. In Stroud's world, London (and the world in general) is and has always been ruled by magicians, so young Nathanial is destined to become part of the elite. But at the tender age of 11 he is humiliated by one Simon Lovelace at a party hosted by his master. From then on Nathanial is consumed by a childish desire for revenge and by 12 he's studied enough to summon a several thousand year old djinn by the name of Bartimaeus to steal a powerful amulet from Lovelace.
Of course these things never go as planned and Nathanial ends up in a lot of hot water as he's drawn into a world of intrigue and murder that he had no idea existed. Some of actions have dire, permanent consequences, which was refreshing to see in a children's book.
But I had a huge problem with this book. It had two points of view. (That's not the part I had a problem with, I'm getting there) One being an odd mix of third person-first person told from Bartimaeus' PoV, and the other from Nathanial's PoV. Bartimaeus' voice is droll, a little bit sarcastic, and very cynical. There is at least one footnote per page, often more, delivering some sort of explanation or droll aside. It was funny at first, then it got old and annoying. The problem though, is that neither character is relatable. I spent the entire book waiting to fall in love with the characters, or to be taken in by the fascinating dynamics of their relationship. But it didn't happen.
I hated Nathanial with a passion with the whole way through. Stroud wrote Nathanial as a boy who has very little empathy. He's cold and removed because he grew up in an emotionally abusive household with no friends. It worked too well though, Nathanial alienates the reader over and over. It's not that he's a bad person. I love having immoral characters in my books. They are often my favorites. But this kid is the perfect combination of self-importance, incompetence, and tantrums to turn the reader off. He's not endearing. He's not even good at being self-obsessed.
Bartimaeus on the other hand turned me off because his narrative was so detached. Stroud tries to be witty, perhaps pull in a bit of Terry Pratchett, but Pratchett is famous because few can do what he does. Bartimaeus' voice falls flat more often than it doesn't. Plus, Stroud does a good job of showing us that Bartimaeus is. not. human. He doesn't think like us, he doesn't like us, and he wants nothing to do with us. Stroud does such a good job that it was almost impossible for me to become emotionally attached.
On the other hand, if you are a plotty person (which I'm not usually), then you'll probably enjoy this book. It's brimming with plot (though sometimes Bartimaeus waxes poetic about how he sneaks into places for just a bit too long) and Stroud even manages to pull a couple of surprises, hard to do with the jaded reader. My one complaint was that the ending could have been a bit tighter. It's not bad, it just drags on a bit. Cut about 50-75 pages and it would have made it snappy in just the right way. Though I think part of the reason it dragged on was that Stroud was setting up the next book.