Rossamund has begun training as a lamplighter, which he quickly realizes he doesn't have much talent for. Just as he begins to settle into his routine, the barricaded city of Westermill is beset by monster attacks, a girl joins the ranks of the lamplighters (which is unheard of), and old friends and acquaintances make sudden reappearances in Rossamund's life. Mysterious dark deeds, political hoodwinking and strong-willed females have Rossamund caught in one undesirable net of confusion.
You know, after mentally trudging through 600 pages (not including the index) I'm a bit worn out. Not that it was painful per se, but recounting it all certainly would be. As you probably noticed with my incredibly detailed and verbose story summarization. How about I do us all favor and itemize this one? Okay then.
- What I said originally about the world Cornish has created still holds true in The Lamplighter. I enjoy his world, and his pictures!, of strange lightening-wielding humans and good-or-evil monsters, etc. All very creative.
- It's SO long. And wordy. I like certain kinds of Wordy, but this story just gets so bogged down in the details. The immense descriptions and overuse of invented terms seem wrong for the genre (adventure-fantasy for kids). Perhaps I've become rushed, impatient and slightly ADD in my old age, but I feel confident in asserting that I would've never gotten through the second chapter a child or teen.
- Not enough action. For the plot and length of the book there should be plenty of action/adventure/intrigue scenes, but they're few and far between and often seem flat. The intrigue that was there was . . . well, unintriguing. The Mystery was fairly obvious a few hundred pages before Rossamund ever put it together and I found myself doing lots of eye-rolling and audible sighing whilst thinking that Rossamund really is just as daft and oblivious and he often seems.
- I about threw the book across the room when I got to the end because - low and behold - it's NOT THE END. And because I hate not having resolution I know I'll end up reading the next one, whenever that comes out.
This sounds all very bitter doesn't it? The thing is, I did like it. But I wanted to LOVE it, so there's something of a let-down.
3 out of 5 turkeys. Recommended if you have an upcoming family reunion you're dreading and need an excuse something along the lines of "I made a commitment to read ALL of this before I return home and I keep my promises!"
Book source: Local library.
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