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| Barnaby Grimes: Legion of the Dead |
Barnaby Grimes is a tick-tock lad, delivering messages and running errands all over the city, day and night. Gangland funerals and diving expeditions are hazardous enough, but it is when the graveyards begin to give up their secrets that this tick-tock lad faces his deadliest challenge yet. Read this blood-curdling tale of greed and betrayal, if you dare, and find out whether Barnaby will be defeated by the Legion of the Dead...
Take a step back in time to a fantasy Victorian England where messages are delivered by tick-tock lads, some of them using the conventional roads of London, others, like Barnaby, highstacking across the rooftops. Barnaby Grimes is one of the few, and as a result the best, who risk the rooftops, as a result he is one of the best tick-tock lads, fast and reliable. When he latest errand takes him over to the docks and slums of London it seems that there are some nasty surprises in store for him. Running into a gang of thugs he is quick to identify a familiar face but just as quickly finds himself attending the funeral of one of the infamous gang bosses. Which is worse, slums or a funeral in a graveyard which has seen the dead rise?
Just when it seems things couldn’t get worse one of Barnaby’s clients, the indubitable Professor, asks for Barnaby’s assistance on a diving trip, so it is back to the docks, this time to delve into the deep waters and fight off sea monsters! Here events take a turn for the worse and leave the reader wondering how Barnaby will ever find the answer to his many burning questions. Follow Barnaby as he gets drawn into a sinister and frightening adventure in the fantastic, yet somehow realistic Victorian London.
The talents of Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell have once again combined to produce a beautifully illustrated compelling story. ‘Barnaby Grimes: Legion of the Dead’ combines of fact, fiction, horror and adventure with the text being spookily bought to life through the black and white illustration.
A great story but not one for the faint-hearted!
2008-06-29
Write Review Recommend Print | Listing Information | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Author: | Paul Stewart | |||
| Illustrator: | Chris Riddell | |||
| Genre: | Horror | |||
| Age Range (see age categories): | 9+ | |||
| Theme/Subject: | Horror, Advneture | |||
| Publisher: | Doubleday | |||
| ISBN: | 9780385611930 | |||
| Reviewer: | Louise Ellis-Barrett | |||
| Title: | Barnaby Grimes: Legion of the Dead | |||
| Hits: | 140 | |||
| Added: | 2008-06-29 10:59:34 | |||
| Last updated: | 2008-06-29 15:00:25 | |||
Reviewed by Mr E, 2008-07-13 Synopsis: Barnaby Grimes, highstacking tick-tock lad extraordinaire, faces his toughest challenge yet. A grave-robbing scare and an impending gang war catch Barnaby’s interest, but he is not motivated by public spirit or curiosity, but by a need to find the truth behind the horrible vision which now haunts his mind. Can he find the resurrection men and lay his fears to rest? Or are the dead really rising from the grave of their own accord? And if the latter, then why?
Review: Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell have created many fantastic worlds, some – like the Edge – far removed from reality, others much closer to it. The world of Barnaby Grimes is in many ways that of Victorian London, just with a lot more weirdness; this is a part of why it works and one has to wonder what young children, not yet steeped in the conventions of period drama, might make of it. Of course, one really has to face the fact that they are probably here for the zombies and the curses and leave it at that.
The Barnaby Grimes novels are miniature masterpieces, quick and easy to read, yet full of detail and beautiful to behold. Aside form a minor quibble of continuity – Barnaby appears to have completely forgotten a) his kung fu mentor and b) his kung fu mental discipline since the end of the last book – this is an excellent entry into the series.
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Company No. 6046315