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3.72 AVERAGE
3.72 AVERAGE
Just reading this to get through the series as I started it ages ago but never finished. Obviously, I'm a lot older so it's not as entertaining but it is still good. Better than Harry Potter at least. I actually like Charlie's character he's more developed than most child characters.
Sometimes I'm a bit disappointed by a childhood fave, but not this time! This book is so great 😍
adventurous
lighthearted
sad
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
Meet Charlie and his mom who live with her mother, a weird uncle and nasty grandmother (deceased father's mother). Charlie discovers he is "endowed" with psychic power of hearing people in photos talk, must go to Boor's Academy--boards there during school weeks.
Well that was quite a waste of time. I only read beyond the first couple of chapters to learn what the point of the whole thing was, and there really isn't one.
This was obviously Ms Nimmo's attempt at a Harry Potter type story. It's not an exact copy or anything, but it's pretty difficult to miss that she was hugely influenced by Rowling's world. Unfortunately, this is nowhere near as good as Harry Potter. It's barely even coherent. If I had to guess, I'd say it's probably because it was a forced attempt to cash in on the Harry Potter craze.
The writing isn't great. It's choppy and awkward. Ms. Nimmo likes to jump around suddenly with no natural transition. You'd be following Charlie for nearly an entire chapter, and then suddenly be focused on Billy or Fidelio right as Charlie is doing something. Several times, I had to stop and and go back and reread to find out what the heck just happened.
As for the story itself:
*Slow and uneventful.
*There is absolutely no point to Bloor's Academy. At least not one that makes any kind of sense.
It's supposed to be a school for geniuses. Okay, sure. There wasn't much to indicate that anyone there was actually very smart, but alright. But then, it's also a school for the "endowed" kids. Why? What purpose does it serve to have any of those kids there? There's no training for any of them, and there's no management of their powers at all. Well, other than their endowed only homework session. Not any special homework, of course. They just all have to sit at the same table, work on whatever they have, and not talk. It was entirely pointless.
There wasn't even a point in keeping them separated from public school because apparently no one cares if the world knows they have special powers.
*Speaking of pointless, most of their "gifts" were totally useless outside of the wacky non-plot of this book. (Can you say 'contrived'?) I mean, making light bulbs explode? Hearing voices in pictures? "Feeling" things from the person whose garment you're wearing?
Very practical, useful powers...sure... I was waiting for the kids to pop up, who could hear colors or speak to doorknobs.
*Where are the police throughout this whole thing? Police are mentioned later in the book, so we do know they exist in this world, but where the heck have they been all along? Kids have gone missing and been traumatized in their "ruin game". In any kind of reality, the ruins would have been condemned. There's no way something like that would be allowed to exist in the middle of a school, and there would have been investigations into the missing kids. For a while at least. In reality, the school would have been shut down long before Charlie had a chance to go there.
And speaking of missing kids, the entire premise of Mr. Tolly giving Emma away was ridiculous. I get that it's a kids book and all, but even kids aren't naive enough to believe people can just hand off their babies on a whim and no one would care.
*The big drama to get the birth certificate back was stupid. Perhaps they hadn't heard of a little thing called DNA? It would have been exceptionally easy for the authorities to prove that Emma was related to her aunt through a very basic test.
But somehow, it was super easy for them to tell that the signature on the adoption papers was a forgery. Um....what? They care about that, but not her physical DNA and who her actual family is? Or how she came to be in the care of her adoptive family?
Then at the end, Emma and her aunt don't want to bother with the details, so they stop caring that Emma was imprisoned her entire life and that her father was murdered. And Emma is perfectly happy to return to the school that is run by her captors.
*Emma being hypnotized was totally unnecessary and pretty stupid. A two year old has no clue what their true identity is. If a child is kidnapped at that age and raised away from their family, they don't remember their family. Emma "waking up" was just stupid. What was she waking up from? It's the only life she ever knew. Crappy maybe, but not something she'd see as being wrong just because some switch was flipped in her brain.
On top of that, her involvement in the story had basically no purpose at all.
She was kidnapped as incentive for her father to get the thing in the case working - for some unknown reason. Once he failed, they had no reason to want to keep the baby. After he died, they really had no reason to keep her. Not even as some sort of punishment. Cuz he's dead and no longer cares. It was far more inconvenient for them to keep her because they were paying her fake family lots and lots of money.
The plot literally makes no sense whatsoever.
*Charlie, his mom, and several other people in this story are incredibly dense. Charlie would miss painfully obvious thing after painfully obvious thing and I'd just shake my head. Apparently Ms Nimmo thinks kids are idiots.
The best was when he writes off the strange (and exceptionally talented) music teacher in the tower, who seems to be in a trance. After learning that his father was still alive. After learning that he was lost and likely hypnotized. After learning that he was an exceptionally talented musician.
I mean, it was like a week(if that)after he learned all of that, yet he never stops to go, 'hmmm'.
His mom was either incredibly stupid or incredibly lazy.
Her excuse for forcing Charlie to go to Bloors was that she didn't have any money. That after his father 'died', he left them with nothing and so they had to rely on his hated grandmother for everything.
She has a part time job though. Where is that money going? Why doesn't she get a full time job? Why isn't she looking for other work? Why isn't his other grandmother doing anything?
Just how lazy are these people?
Rather than getting a real job, she'll rely on the woman(and her sisters) who she's pretty sure murdered her husband (their own son and nephew), just because she doesn't want to work 40 hours a week?
And then you've got the opposite in Ben's parents who are so busy working, they barely even remember they have a kid. Um, CPS?
On top of all that, there's no indication that Charlie's grandma or any of her sisters have any kind of power. It's stated that they're powerful, but there's no power actually mentioned or even alluded to. They can't even figure out how to get into Ben's house to look for the case they want (for some reason) - four supposedly powerful adults can't figure out how to get past a relatively gullible 10-12 year old kid who is perpetually home alone.
Why exactly is Charlie and his mother so afraid of them? Why is Paton? And why does Paton feel so empowered after deciding to embrace his light bulb bursting power? Are they afraid of bursting light bulbs?
And why do they want Charlie to go to Bloor's anyway? Aside from there being no point in the endowed kids going there, (I'm guessing here) they must know his father is there.
So, they want him to think his father is dead for some reason, but they decide to send him to the one place he can bump into him. The one place he will meet other kids with oddly specific gifts to lead Charlie right to his dad.
Not that he's smart enough to catch on of course.
All that aside, there were some pretty random and stupid things that jumped out at me.
*What the heck is with the capes? Why do they need capes at all? Why are they color coded? And why do people freak out if a kid doesn't have one?
*What's with the various cafeterias? There's a large cafeteria they all use for dinner. It's clearly big enough to hold everyone. What's the point of the other cafeterias? Lots more work for the heck of it?
*Why aren't kids allowed to talk practically ever? Olivia falls and she gets in trouble for making noise.
*Why aren't they allowed to swap the food they won't eat with a kid who will?
*What's with the "Mom's don't exist here" line? It would have fit if they made fun of Charlie for wanting his mom or something, but why the ominous and fairly idiotic statement?
It's never explained.
It was like the author just wanted to make it a weird place without putting the effort in to have any of the weird things make any kind of sense.
Other incredibly stupid things that stuck out:
*Ben magically being able to play the flute.
I play the flute. Unless someone is extraordinarily gifted -and I mean with magic - they aren't going to be playing the flute in a time span of ten minutes. It takes quite a bit longer than that to get any kind of sound out of it at all. Sometimes it can take kids days of practicing through frustration to get their mouth positioned in the right way. Forget learning the notes and fingerings.
But in this story, Ben picks up the flute with no prior experience and "Sure enough, in less than ten minutes, Benjamin was playing the flute."
Um, sure.
*When Dr. Bloor sees Charlie.
He approaches him like a psycho, says his name ominously and that it's a pleasure to meet him, before walking away. Then after everyone's done eating, he makes him stand (again ominously) and gives him bland instructions that he easily could have given him before.
No point, yet again.
*When Ben thinks Fidelio "just looks musical", and offers no explanation as to why. How does someone look musical?
*The names! Fidelio, Eustacia, Dorcas, Manfred, Lysander, Tancred...
A few odd names are fine in this type of story, but this was getting ridiculous.
*When Olivia giggles while hiding in a closet that is literally full of skeletons, when they think they're about to be caught and possibly killed by a psychopath. There's no indication of her finding anything funny, but suddenly she has trouble stopping her giggles.
Is she nuts? Bipolar maybe?
I'm sure there's lots more I could go on and on about, but I'll stop there.
Suffice it to say, I will not be continuing on with the series.
How anyone past the age of 8 thinks this even comes close to Harry Potter is beyond me.
This was obviously Ms Nimmo's attempt at a Harry Potter type story. It's not an exact copy or anything, but it's pretty difficult to miss that she was hugely influenced by Rowling's world. Unfortunately, this is nowhere near as good as Harry Potter. It's barely even coherent. If I had to guess, I'd say it's probably because it was a forced attempt to cash in on the Harry Potter craze.
The writing isn't great. It's choppy and awkward. Ms. Nimmo likes to jump around suddenly with no natural transition. You'd be following Charlie for nearly an entire chapter, and then suddenly be focused on Billy or Fidelio right as Charlie is doing something. Several times, I had to stop and and go back and reread to find out what the heck just happened.
As for the story itself:
*Slow and uneventful.
*There is absolutely no point to Bloor's Academy. At least not one that makes any kind of sense.
It's supposed to be a school for geniuses. Okay, sure. There wasn't much to indicate that anyone there was actually very smart, but alright. But then, it's also a school for the "endowed" kids. Why? What purpose does it serve to have any of those kids there? There's no training for any of them, and there's no management of their powers at all. Well, other than their endowed only homework session. Not any special homework, of course. They just all have to sit at the same table, work on whatever they have, and not talk. It was entirely pointless.
There wasn't even a point in keeping them separated from public school because apparently no one cares if the world knows they have special powers.
*Speaking of pointless, most of their "gifts" were totally useless outside of the wacky non-plot of this book. (Can you say 'contrived'?) I mean, making light bulbs explode? Hearing voices in pictures? "Feeling" things from the person whose garment you're wearing?
Very practical, useful powers...sure... I was waiting for the kids to pop up, who could hear colors or speak to doorknobs.
*Where are the police throughout this whole thing? Police are mentioned later in the book, so we do know they exist in this world, but where the heck have they been all along? Kids have gone missing and been traumatized in their "ruin game". In any kind of reality, the ruins would have been condemned. There's no way something like that would be allowed to exist in the middle of a school, and there would have been investigations into the missing kids. For a while at least. In reality, the school would have been shut down long before Charlie had a chance to go there.
And speaking of missing kids, the entire premise of Mr. Tolly giving Emma away was ridiculous. I get that it's a kids book and all, but even kids aren't naive enough to believe people can just hand off their babies on a whim and no one would care.
*The big drama to get the birth certificate back was stupid. Perhaps they hadn't heard of a little thing called DNA? It would have been exceptionally easy for the authorities to prove that Emma was related to her aunt through a very basic test.
But somehow, it was super easy for them to tell that the signature on the adoption papers was a forgery. Um....what? They care about that, but not her physical DNA and who her actual family is? Or how she came to be in the care of her adoptive family?
Then at the end, Emma and her aunt don't want to bother with the details, so they stop caring that Emma was imprisoned her entire life and that her father was murdered. And Emma is perfectly happy to return to the school that is run by her captors.
*Emma being hypnotized was totally unnecessary and pretty stupid. A two year old has no clue what their true identity is. If a child is kidnapped at that age and raised away from their family, they don't remember their family. Emma "waking up" was just stupid. What was she waking up from? It's the only life she ever knew. Crappy maybe, but not something she'd see as being wrong just because some switch was flipped in her brain.
On top of that, her involvement in the story had basically no purpose at all.
She was kidnapped as incentive for her father to get the thing in the case working - for some unknown reason. Once he failed, they had no reason to want to keep the baby. After he died, they really had no reason to keep her. Not even as some sort of punishment. Cuz he's dead and no longer cares. It was far more inconvenient for them to keep her because they were paying her fake family lots and lots of money.
The plot literally makes no sense whatsoever.
*Charlie, his mom, and several other people in this story are incredibly dense. Charlie would miss painfully obvious thing after painfully obvious thing and I'd just shake my head. Apparently Ms Nimmo thinks kids are idiots.
The best was when he writes off the strange (and exceptionally talented) music teacher in the tower, who seems to be in a trance. After learning that his father was still alive. After learning that he was lost and likely hypnotized. After learning that he was an exceptionally talented musician.
I mean, it was like a week(if that)after he learned all of that, yet he never stops to go, 'hmmm'.
His mom was either incredibly stupid or incredibly lazy.
Her excuse for forcing Charlie to go to Bloors was that she didn't have any money. That after his father 'died', he left them with nothing and so they had to rely on his hated grandmother for everything.
She has a part time job though. Where is that money going? Why doesn't she get a full time job? Why isn't she looking for other work? Why isn't his other grandmother doing anything?
Just how lazy are these people?
Rather than getting a real job, she'll rely on the woman(and her sisters) who she's pretty sure murdered her husband (their own son and nephew), just because she doesn't want to work 40 hours a week?
And then you've got the opposite in Ben's parents who are so busy working, they barely even remember they have a kid. Um, CPS?
On top of all that, there's no indication that Charlie's grandma or any of her sisters have any kind of power. It's stated that they're powerful, but there's no power actually mentioned or even alluded to. They can't even figure out how to get into Ben's house to look for the case they want (for some reason) - four supposedly powerful adults can't figure out how to get past a relatively gullible 10-12 year old kid who is perpetually home alone.
Why exactly is Charlie and his mother so afraid of them? Why is Paton? And why does Paton feel so empowered after deciding to embrace his light bulb bursting power? Are they afraid of bursting light bulbs?
And why do they want Charlie to go to Bloor's anyway? Aside from there being no point in the endowed kids going there, (I'm guessing here) they must know his father is there.
So, they want him to think his father is dead for some reason, but they decide to send him to the one place he can bump into him. The one place he will meet other kids with oddly specific gifts to lead Charlie right to his dad.
Not that he's smart enough to catch on of course.
All that aside, there were some pretty random and stupid things that jumped out at me.
*What the heck is with the capes? Why do they need capes at all? Why are they color coded? And why do people freak out if a kid doesn't have one?
*What's with the various cafeterias? There's a large cafeteria they all use for dinner. It's clearly big enough to hold everyone. What's the point of the other cafeterias? Lots more work for the heck of it?
*Why aren't kids allowed to talk practically ever? Olivia falls and she gets in trouble for making noise.
*Why aren't they allowed to swap the food they won't eat with a kid who will?
*What's with the "Mom's don't exist here" line? It would have fit if they made fun of Charlie for wanting his mom or something, but why the ominous and fairly idiotic statement?
It's never explained.
It was like the author just wanted to make it a weird place without putting the effort in to have any of the weird things make any kind of sense.
Other incredibly stupid things that stuck out:
*Ben magically being able to play the flute.
I play the flute. Unless someone is extraordinarily gifted -and I mean with magic - they aren't going to be playing the flute in a time span of ten minutes. It takes quite a bit longer than that to get any kind of sound out of it at all. Sometimes it can take kids days of practicing through frustration to get their mouth positioned in the right way. Forget learning the notes and fingerings.
But in this story, Ben picks up the flute with no prior experience and "Sure enough, in less than ten minutes, Benjamin was playing the flute."
Um, sure.
*When Dr. Bloor sees Charlie.
He approaches him like a psycho, says his name ominously and that it's a pleasure to meet him, before walking away. Then after everyone's done eating, he makes him stand (again ominously) and gives him bland instructions that he easily could have given him before.
No point, yet again.
*When Ben thinks Fidelio "just looks musical", and offers no explanation as to why. How does someone look musical?
*The names! Fidelio, Eustacia, Dorcas, Manfred, Lysander, Tancred...
A few odd names are fine in this type of story, but this was getting ridiculous.
*When Olivia giggles while hiding in a closet that is literally full of skeletons, when they think they're about to be caught and possibly killed by a psychopath. There's no indication of her finding anything funny, but suddenly she has trouble stopping her giggles.
Is she nuts? Bipolar maybe?
I'm sure there's lots more I could go on and on about, but I'll stop there.
Suffice it to say, I will not be continuing on with the series.
How anyone past the age of 8 thinks this even comes close to Harry Potter is beyond me.
Another childhood reread. I got into this around the time I read Harry Potter but HP overshadowed it by alot. I'm pretty sure I've been going back to my childhood reads due to the new realizations around Rowling and my disappointment can't be put to words. So I'm probably searching for other childhood nuggets to fall onto while I go through my pain around HP.
This honestly, is not as exciting as I remember it but it could be the second book that picks up. Most of this is seems to be background and setup. I thought I remembered a more exciting setup of the school system but it's pretty simple. The prose is much simpler than other comparable books but I feel the story is more original than the others which I love. Will definitely keep reading.
This honestly, is not as exciting as I remember it but it could be the second book that picks up. Most of this is seems to be background and setup. I thought I remembered a more exciting setup of the school system but it's pretty simple. The prose is much simpler than other comparable books but I feel the story is more original than the others which I love. Will definitely keep reading.
Now first let me get this out of the way. A lot of people think Charlie Bone is a downright rip-off of Harry Potter. I'm here to tell you that No, it is not. In fact it is very different. YES it does have a character who finds out he has a magical ability, and YES he gets sent to a school/academy where other children have these magical powers (although the majority of the children at the school don't have powers, and the powers don't involve wands and brooms). That's about all that is similar to Harry Potter in this series, and I find it sad how people won't give this series a try because of that. A "magical school" shouldn't be left only for Harry Potter, I believe it can be used in many different ways so that the idea never feels the same. And this is coming from a Harry Potter fan.
Anyway... on with the review shall we?
Charlie Bone is a story about a young boy who discovers he is "endowed", meaning, has a magical power, and can hear people in photographs. He is then forced by his grandma to go to Bloors Academy, a school for endowed children, as well as children who are just very smart. The children at the academy are split into three groups with their own color, judging by their endowed power or prodigy; blue for the musical, purple for the drama group, and green for the art group. All the children must wear a cape with the color of their group. Charlie Bone is set into the music group, although his power doesn't have to do with music but he has no other talent, so screw it, he's put in the music group. This academy does not seem similar to Hogwarts at all to me, as all the classes are basically normal such as English, math, music etc. The academy is run by the evil Bloor's family, and it's obvious they are keeping something secret from everyone. And of course, it is Charlie's job (as well as his friends and a family member) to reveal what the Bloor family is hiding.
That's the basic storyline, without getting into spoilers, so now let's talk about if this book is good or not. It is obvious this book is for a young age, It even seems less dark and more basic then Harry Potter, So I would say it is a great book to start younger kids on. However, I believe this book can be enjoyed by any age, as I am 18 years old and I still thoroughly enjoyed my time reading Charlie Bone. Although I do feel that I would have liked it A LOT more if I was younger. When I started reading this book I knew what to expect, and I was in a 'mood' to read a easy and quick adventure fantasy novel. This book gave me exactly what I wanted, a cute, fast read, that took me on an adventure.
I don't have all praise for this book, there is still a lot of things that could have been improved on. Let's start with the characters. The personalities for the characters were pretty basic and I found that I didn't really enjoy them that much and at times they seemed to lack emotion. Besides Charlie's uncle Paton. Uncle Paton is the best. I was already sort of expecting basic character design though, because this is a book that's leaned towards a young audience, but I still think it could have been better. The writing style was pretty good, although at times it switched character in the next paragraph and I feel it would have been better to make a pause in between switching characters by adding a line/sub-chapter type of thing. I'm not sure what it was about this book (maybe because it was a very easy read) but I found that I could picture every scene perfectly in my mind while I read, so I mean, that's good. The overall plot was good, but at times it seemed to be lacking, and I wish there was more fast paced adventure in between.
With its flaws I still thoroughly enjoyed Midnight For Charlie Bone, and I will be continuing the series. I totally recommend Charlie Bone to any parent who would like to introduce their child to a new book, or just to anyone of any age who wants to read a quick, light-hearted (yet still somewhat dark) story. This book is not at all as good as Harry Potter, but it's still a great adventure
Anyway... on with the review shall we?
Charlie Bone is a story about a young boy who discovers he is "endowed", meaning, has a magical power, and can hear people in photographs. He is then forced by his grandma to go to Bloors Academy, a school for endowed children, as well as children who are just very smart. The children at the academy are split into three groups with their own color, judging by their endowed power or prodigy; blue for the musical, purple for the drama group, and green for the art group. All the children must wear a cape with the color of their group. Charlie Bone is set into the music group, although his power doesn't have to do with music but he has no other talent, so screw it, he's put in the music group. This academy does not seem similar to Hogwarts at all to me, as all the classes are basically normal such as English, math, music etc. The academy is run by the evil Bloor's family, and it's obvious they are keeping something secret from everyone. And of course, it is Charlie's job (as well as his friends and a family member) to reveal what the Bloor family is hiding.
That's the basic storyline, without getting into spoilers, so now let's talk about if this book is good or not. It is obvious this book is for a young age, It even seems less dark and more basic then Harry Potter, So I would say it is a great book to start younger kids on. However, I believe this book can be enjoyed by any age, as I am 18 years old and I still thoroughly enjoyed my time reading Charlie Bone. Although I do feel that I would have liked it A LOT more if I was younger. When I started reading this book I knew what to expect, and I was in a 'mood' to read a easy and quick adventure fantasy novel. This book gave me exactly what I wanted, a cute, fast read, that took me on an adventure.
I don't have all praise for this book, there is still a lot of things that could have been improved on. Let's start with the characters. The personalities for the characters were pretty basic and I found that I didn't really enjoy them that much and at times they seemed to lack emotion. Besides Charlie's uncle Paton. Uncle Paton is the best. I was already sort of expecting basic character design though, because this is a book that's leaned towards a young audience, but I still think it could have been better. The writing style was pretty good, although at times it switched character in the next paragraph and I feel it would have been better to make a pause in between switching characters by adding a line/sub-chapter type of thing. I'm not sure what it was about this book (maybe because it was a very easy read) but I found that I could picture every scene perfectly in my mind while I read, so I mean, that's good. The overall plot was good, but at times it seemed to be lacking, and I wish there was more fast paced adventure in between.
With its flaws I still thoroughly enjoyed Midnight For Charlie Bone, and I will be continuing the series. I totally recommend Charlie Bone to any parent who would like to introduce their child to a new book, or just to anyone of any age who wants to read a quick, light-hearted (yet still somewhat dark) story. This book is not at all as good as Harry Potter, but it's still a great adventure