Midnight for Charlie Bone (The Children of the Red King, Book 1)
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Midnight for Charlie Bone (The Children of the Red King, Book 1)
Customer Review: got here quickly
this product was mailed to me quickly and I’m very happy with the service I recieved
Customer Review: Not a horrible book; just not a very good one
(I read the first 3 Charlie Bone books, so this review is probably more of an indictment of the entire series in general rather than any one book in particular.)
It will be immediately obvious to anyone who reads the back cover that this entire series is nothing more than a Harry Potter knockoff. Personally, I don’t have a problem with this. Congruent themes - or even glaringly overt similarities - between novels and/or characters is fine with me. Ergo, just as there is room in my heart for both Superman and Captain Marvel, Aquaman and Submariner, there is room for both HP and the endless series of inevitable clones that followed it.
That said, Charlie Bone falls well short of the Potter series in a number of ways. Like any xeroxed item, imperfections that were barely noticeable in the original (ie, the HP books) become gross and compounded in a copy. If I laid out all the flaws I’d be here all day, so I will just highlight a few.
First the characters seem underdeveloped. They all come across as simple constructs, and mostly one-dimensional. This leads to a fair amount of predictability in the series. In fact, with this series, readers will be able to see around corners in a sense because the level of predicatability is so high that you will know well in advance exactly what’s coimg and exactly how things will shake out.
Next, all of the major characters seem to behave in ways that are so abominably stupid that it’s hard for readers to relate or empathize. Information that should be held private is blurted out indiscriminately at the first available opportunity, whereas vital information that should be shared is kept locked up like gold in Fort Knox. Examples:
1) Charlie’s great-uncle is injured - purportedly dying - but rather than tell what happened to him (or who did it), he just mopes around saying, “I’m done for…he’s killed me…{blah,blah,blah}” He does this for DAYS, mind you, during which time he has multiple conversations with Charlie. But every time Charlie asks what happend, it’s “Later…” or “Another time…” or “Charlie, I’m done for…”
2) The cook at Charlie’s school is a friend who tries to protect Charlie and his friends from danger. She has a secret room that she asks Charlie not to tell anyone about. Next thing you know, he’s not only telling people but showing them how to get in!
3) An invisible boy is not chained to a wall, locked up, ensorcelled or enchanted, etc., but yet is “trapped” merely by being invisible and forced to serve the antagonists in the series. Yes, he can go anywhere he wants, he can speak to whomever he wants, etc. But he doesn’t even go so far as to let his family know he is even alive and (except for being invisible) well.
4) One of the people living in Charlie’s house is his evil paternal Grandmother. She is always working against Charlie’s interests, and he knows this. Yet, he will still live critical items just lying around, knowing that she constantly looks around his room and goes through his things.
Finally, the series is quite unsatisfying in the sense that villains never get their comeuppance. They constantly seem to have Charlie & Company on the ropes, while landing solid body blows. The end result always seems to be more that Charlie ducked a punch rather than landed a jab of his own. I’m not sayimg that I expect the bad guys to be utterly defeated, but it seems that they never get even so much as a bloody nose.
On the positive side, the books are a fairly easy read. The average reader can probably get through one of these books in a weekend. There are glimpses of how great the series could have been: Charlie’s power - the ability to hear and interact with people in photos (or paintings, etc) is novel enough to have taken the series in all kinds of interesting directions. Some of Charlie’s classmates have interesting powers as well.
All in all, I would say that the series simply suffers from a lack of development. Maybe it was rushed out to ride on the Harry Potter wave before things died down. Regardless, I think this series had a great premise, but never reached its true potential.
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