Peter and the Starcatchers

Alright, I have a confession to make. I've been hooked on another series of books and have been reading them, instead of our book club books. Naughty, I know :) Cory started reading Peter and the Starcatchers (since I was neglecting it, oops!) and he said it was intriguing. I started reading it and bam, was hooked. It's entertaining and the characters were interesting. I wanted to find out what happened, so I kept reading.

And now, can I just say "amen" to Chad's post and call it good? I agree with him. The characters were all well-developed. It was very entertaining (I love Dave Barry... I've always thought he's hilarious). It did move quickly and made for a short, but good, read. It was adventurous. Witty. And I loved how they threw in some other references -- like how the Loch Ness monster was created, or how all the Greek mythology was actually people just hopped up on 'starstuff'.

The ending did feel a little rushed to me, too. Within the space of only a few pages, Peter defeats Black Stache (love that name, by the way), learns he can fly, learns he won't grow old, decides to stay forever on the island, and gets a fairy. I think a little more details would have been good, since the rest was more well-developed. But it was still a thoroughly enjoyable read. I'm definitely going to look into getting the other books in the series from the library.

On sale now...

Just in case somebody hasn't started Peter and the Starcatchers yet, it's on sale at Audible for $5. I've been buying audio books from them for a couple years and like the company a lot. Unfortunately I bought it a couple weeks ago before the sale. This particular book is narrated very well.

Peter and the Starcatchers

As with most books I "read" these days, I listened to the audio version of Peter and the Starcatchers. I started it with my son Kevin, (6 yrs old) but at the pace we were going, it would have taken us a couple months to finish. I ended up reading most of it Friday while working in my shop. Kevin is really in to it, and this is a great book to enjoy with younger kids! Who doesn't like a good pirate story?

My background of Peter Pan is mostly limited to a few plays and a condensed version on vinyl I listened to as a kid. I don't even recall seeing the Disney movie before, although I've watched Robin Williams in Hook, and perhaps a couple others. In another post Never Fairy mentioned this book doesn't follow the original storyline very well, but due to my ignorance, I was able to thoroughly enjoy it anyway.

Reading Starcatchers reminded me a lot of Treasure Island, but better. I found the pace moved quickly, the characters entertaining, and the production (Audible version) outstanding. Aside from Peter and Molly, I liked other characters such as Tubby Ted, (we share similar priorities) Black Stache and his "ladies", and the token big dumb sidekick, Little Richard.

My only complaint is the ending felt a little rushed while tying this in to the original Peter Pan story. The future Captain Hook and his nemesis Mr Grin were developed well, but other elements like the realization of Peter's flight, his inability to age, and creation of Tinkerbell all seemed to be jammed in at the last minute. All things considered, this was a fun light read, and Dave Barry's humorous undertones kept me smiling. I'm sure I'll check out the next three books in this series!