Artemis Fowl (Artemis Fowl #1)

A memorable Middle Grade urban fantasy featuring a hidden subterranean world of "faerie" people, a female "cop" with a lot to prove to her own technologically advanced-yet-misogynistic people, a deadly and dedicated bodyguard, and one 12-year-old Irish prodigy with deviant aspirations for securing his family fortunes.

Colfer has a clever and pithy way about his prose that feels reminiscent of Douglass Adams crossed with Terry Pratchett--plenty of droll sarcasm and social commentary without a caustic aftertaste. The characterization is strong, the pacing is snappy, and the variable points of view work effortlessly with the flow of the telling.

Artemis (whose name I still wish was explained, it being far from Irish and traditionally female) is a shakily sympathetic quasi-villain of a character. His intelligence is admirable and his motives, while shady, are at least somewhat justifiable. With his father missing and presumed dead and his mother slipping steadily into insanity, he has been left to his own formidable devices. He isn't cruel or malicious by nature, but he is borderline arrogant and frequently lacking in empathy. It's an interesting and precarious character to be presented with--a genius prepubescent male with worryingly sociopathic potential. It's almost as though he were teetering between either becoming something on the order of the famed Sherlock Holmes... or his guiltless nemesis, Moriarty.

The paranormal aspect of the world-building is an interesting spin on standard fantasy--featuring elves, dwarves, centaurs, goblins, trolls... all under the unifying name of "The People." One of the twists here being that the faerie people are all in hiding from humanity, and remain so thanks to both their inherent magic and the fact that they are technologically advanced far and beyond humans. They also deeply resent that they had to flee the surface world, and hold a generalized disgust for the "Mudmen" who inhabit and pollute their former home. And despite their tech and social advantages, it's clear that there are significant equality issues for faerie females.

My primary hesitation in recommending this book revolves around just how much character development may occur regarding Artemis, and in which direction. The amount of character growth by the end was unclear, though there appeared to be some vague softening of the boy's more criminal inclinations. There's plenty of room here for personal growth and thoughtful introspection for the title character in future installments--but the end of this particular book is pretty open in that regard.

Will Arty mature into a hero, villain, or anti-hero? It's hard to guess at this juncture. But this reader will gladly give another book or two a try in hopes of finding out.

On the whole, this was a promising start to an engaging series.

Everywhere I go, I see comparisons being made between Artemis Fowl and Harry Potter. Boy, people couldn't be more wrong. Artemis is, if anything, the anti-Harry.

The things they do have in common are their audience and their popularity. Kids are snatching up the first Artemis Fowl book like candy. A movie is already in the works (and hey, you can even win a part by entering the Crack the Code contest at www.artemisfowl.com).

Artemis is a boy genious, born into a family with a colorful (okay, illicit) past. His father disappeared and his mother hasn't been the same since, which has left Artemis pretty much to his own devices.

Artemis is determined to win back the family fortune (not that they seem to be hurting, given their mansion and the fact that he's a millionaire) and has found a way to do it. He bribes a sprite to let him have a look at The Book of the Fairies and promptly captures each page with a digital camera.

After applying a little Fowl know-how and some technical wizardray, he has a translation of the Book. Then the fun really begins.

The book is filled with humor and fairy-tale creatures who don't quite fit the commonly accepted notion of what they should be like. The resulting clash between a criminal-minded human genius and these non-traditional denizens of the fairy world, is incredibly funny and clever.