Almost as delightful as the first one! Again, Trenton Lee Stewart delivers a book as wonderful as his name. The pacing was a little more varied than that of the first book, which I think I enjoyed more (I get anxious easily and use books to help regulate my emotions; so when a book is constantly tense, so am I HAHAHAHAHA [cries]). There is the constant urgency that exists in all but the first and last chapters, but there are more periods of rest for the reader’s heartbeat than the first book contains. The tone of the pre-internet modes of communication remains captivating and fun in a world where four children can go off on their own to save the world. Even so, adults are necessary in the story. The protagonists cannot do everything on their own, but their efforts matter and their dignity equals an adult’s.
Stewart did a better job in this book setting up Reynie’s weakness (lack of trust in others) earlier on in the story, and I like how not only were some of Reynie’s suspicions inaccurate, but some of his intuitions were wrong because they were built on other, more reasonable, but still inaccurate ones. Intuition is always right in two ways: it’s always in response to something, and it always has your best interest at heart. That’s why we should always pay attention to it. But in this case, its accuracy was impaired by Reynie’s beliefs about the world. It worked for an interesting character arc, especially since it followed from the success of the previous book. Reynie and his companions fighting and winning against a bunch of evil grownups and fellow children in the first book helped form a belief that most people are untrustworthy. This general distrust was then part of the sequel. Sticky also had a similar progressive arc—since he gained so much confidence in the first book based on his knowledge, which helped save the world, he now places his identity in others’ appreciation of his knowledge. And how difficult it would be for a young boy, whose parents returned to him after he helped save the world (although that wasn’t the reason for their return), not to believe that his worth and others’ love was based on that. By the end of the book Sticky has yet to learn that his worth does not come from what he does; but he has possibly learned that virtue and effort to do what’s right are more important than perfectionism and knowledge.
I don’t think Kate had an arc in this book or the last one. Constance does learn a bit about herself in this one, and becomes more confident in using her talents, which was fun to see. I’d like to see more development in her in the future, but I think it makes sense not to have a big arc for her in this book (or the previous one) when she is not even four years old.
There was one theme which I disliked: the idea of never killing a bad guy. Milligan says that they (the protagonists) do not kill because they are not like the villains in the story. He says he avoids it when there might be a better option. That latter statement makes sense. However, later on Milligan sacrifices the safety of all four children—one of whom let’s remember is just under four years old—as well as the safety of the entire world, by not killing any of the Ten Men who are actively trying to kill him. It works out in the end, but that didn’t seem to coincide with his earlier statement about avoiding it (which wasn’t pacifistic, but merely reluctant to kill—which I agree with). When Kate has to make similar decisions twice in the book, I think she did make the right decision. Besides, she is 12 or 13 most likely. (At first I thought she thought the villains had the Duskwort near the end of the book, thus perhaps justifying her if she had killed them by throwing the bomb, but I realised later it would have been elsewhere, and they’d have to retrieve it, which she’d have known.) But as for Milligan, let’s remember that, if not for the twist at the end, Mr. Curtain would have gotten the Duskwort and the whole world been in jeopardy. So I think Milligan made a terrible decision to not kill in self-defence. Since he is a secret agent he can be held responsible for making that kind of decision. I do realise that killing people is harder than it sounds, but I felt that the book portrayed his reluctance—even in the face of the children’s mortal danger and the world at stake—as a heroic act. If the author was just trying to say it’s difficult to kill people even when it might be the right thing to do (e.g. self-defence and defence of the innocent), then he could have done that—but I don’t think he did.
I looked at some reviews, and saw folks criticised the riddles, thinking some were way too hard or way too easy. Eh. I don’t really care. I wasn’t reading it to try to figure it out myself. The riddles were sometimes obtuse, and not as good as in the first book, but that didn’t really bother me. Constance’s talent for recognising patterns did become a sort of superpower, but it mostly seemed within the realm of possibilities for me. After all, She is supposed to be a super genius, relatively speaking.
All in all, a good and enjoyable book, and I’ll likely keep reading ‘em!
The Curious Critic 