The Hundred-Towered City by Garry Kilworth
Jan. 7th, 2010 10:40 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quippeThe Blurb On The Back:
Magic ... Mystery ... Monsters
This is exactly what awaits Jack, Annie and Davey when they are transported back in time to the gothic city of Prague, to search for their missing parents. Trying to avoid capture by the secret police, they find themselves running through dark and dangerous cobbled streets where they meet some very shady characters. But where are their parents? And who has stolen the key to the time machine?
Alchemists, mythical creatures and a man with a hook for a hand hold the answers they’re looking for. Will the daring group be in time to save their parents from the eerie Karlstein Castle? And even if they do, how will they return to the present day without the key?
Jack is a 14 year old boy whose dad has invented a time-travelling motorbike. Jack and his sister, Annie and younger brother, Davey are blasé about their parents nipping back to 1903 Prague so that their mother can investigate their family history. That all ends however on the night when a strange man returns home on the motorbike instead of their parents – a man who tells them that their parents have been arrested by Prague’s secret police. Jack and his siblings decide to head back in time to rescue them. In the process they are thrown into a world of intrigue, magic and alchemy and danger that threatens to see them all trapped in a country and time that is not their own.
All of the elements are here for a classic story – time travel, secret police, magical creatures – which makes it a shame that the actual story is so dull and lifeless. Kilworth fails to convey any real sense of what Prague was like in 1903 and while there’s a lot of exposition about the attempt by the authorities to crack down on alchemists and anarchists, there’s little sense of the simmering undercurrents that should be in play. This is a shame as Kilworth has plainly done a lot of research, incorporating details about the lives of a scullery maid and soldier in the text.
Part of the problem is that Kilworth splits his narrative into four basic streams - one for each of children and one for the parents – and the effect is to dilute the impact of his story. The Davey storyline in particular adds nothing and I frequently found myself skimming through his sections while the attempt to create a villain in The Weasel, fails because he only really appears in the parents’ storyline.
Kilworth frequently relies on coincidence and contrivance, e.g. all members of Jack’s family happen to be fluent in German and English for reasons never explained. Similarly the number of times when they happen to come across a friend or find a secret tunnel became too many to count. Character-wise, the children are all rather colourless and at times, their dialogue doesn’t ring true. Annie’s relationship with stablehand Tag gives her some life, but the storyline again doesn’t really go anywhere.
There’s a set-up for a sequel, but given the bland dullness of this storyline, I’m not interested in reading on.
The Verdict:
A potentially interesting story is rendered dull by a listless narrative and too many contrivances.
This is exactly what awaits Jack, Annie and Davey when they are transported back in time to the gothic city of Prague, to search for their missing parents. Trying to avoid capture by the secret police, they find themselves running through dark and dangerous cobbled streets where they meet some very shady characters. But where are their parents? And who has stolen the key to the time machine?
Alchemists, mythical creatures and a man with a hook for a hand hold the answers they’re looking for. Will the daring group be in time to save their parents from the eerie Karlstein Castle? And even if they do, how will they return to the present day without the key?
Jack is a 14 year old boy whose dad has invented a time-travelling motorbike. Jack and his sister, Annie and younger brother, Davey are blasé about their parents nipping back to 1903 Prague so that their mother can investigate their family history. That all ends however on the night when a strange man returns home on the motorbike instead of their parents – a man who tells them that their parents have been arrested by Prague’s secret police. Jack and his siblings decide to head back in time to rescue them. In the process they are thrown into a world of intrigue, magic and alchemy and danger that threatens to see them all trapped in a country and time that is not their own.
All of the elements are here for a classic story – time travel, secret police, magical creatures – which makes it a shame that the actual story is so dull and lifeless. Kilworth fails to convey any real sense of what Prague was like in 1903 and while there’s a lot of exposition about the attempt by the authorities to crack down on alchemists and anarchists, there’s little sense of the simmering undercurrents that should be in play. This is a shame as Kilworth has plainly done a lot of research, incorporating details about the lives of a scullery maid and soldier in the text.
Part of the problem is that Kilworth splits his narrative into four basic streams - one for each of children and one for the parents – and the effect is to dilute the impact of his story. The Davey storyline in particular adds nothing and I frequently found myself skimming through his sections while the attempt to create a villain in The Weasel, fails because he only really appears in the parents’ storyline.
Kilworth frequently relies on coincidence and contrivance, e.g. all members of Jack’s family happen to be fluent in German and English for reasons never explained. Similarly the number of times when they happen to come across a friend or find a secret tunnel became too many to count. Character-wise, the children are all rather colourless and at times, their dialogue doesn’t ring true. Annie’s relationship with stablehand Tag gives her some life, but the storyline again doesn’t really go anywhere.
There’s a set-up for a sequel, but given the bland dullness of this storyline, I’m not interested in reading on.
The Verdict:
A potentially interesting story is rendered dull by a listless narrative and too many contrivances.
