<i>The Reluctant Assassin</i> by Eoin Colfer (review)
2013; Johns Hopkins University Press; Volume: 66; Issue: 10 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/bcc.2013.0359
ISSN1558-6766
Autores Tópico(s)Intelligence, Security, War Strategy
ResumoReviewed by: The Reluctant Assassin by Eoin Colfer Elizabeth Bush, Reviewer Colfer, Eoin The Reluctant Assassin. Hyperion, 2013 [352p] (W.A.R.P.) ISBN 978-1-4231-6162-2 $17.99 Reviewed from galleys R* Gr. 7–10 The FBI is using time-travel technology to hide witnesses in the nineteenth century until they can be safely returned for trial in the twenty-first, and Chevie Sovano, a seventeen-year-old agent, has been temporarily assigned to the Witness Anonymous Relocation Program in London and charged with the tiresome job of keeping watch over a long-disused portal. It’s on her shift, though, that a pair of men come plunging through from 1898—assassin Albert Garrick and his reluctant young apprentice, Riley, who had been caught in the act of murdering a scientist, and not just any scientist but one who possessed a Timekey. Riley makes it through unscathed, but Garrick has melded with expiring time-traveling scientist Dr. Smart: now Garrick has all the cunning from past career as an illusionist, all the darkness of his assassin’s heart, and all of Smart’s knowledge of the twenty-first century. Sounds like the kind of evil guy who’d use his attributes to rule the world, and it’s up to Chevie and Riley, who head up this new series, to stop him. Our teenaged heroes are a likable pair and a canny tag team, but it’s the villains who shine in this series opener. Garrick is blackguard enough to anchor the drama single-handed, but even he is upstaged at points by Otto Malarkey, king of the Battering Rams street gang, and Tibor Charismo, a Victorian cultural celebrity credited with writing [End Page 457] the James Bond novels (Commander James Bond of Her Majesty’s Navy) and composing Pinkus Floyd’s Another Brick in Yonder Wall. Riley and Chevie part company at tale’s end and return to their home centuries in triumph, but a minor character emerges from the murk to indicate that W.A.R.P. has depths still to be plumbed in Book Two and beyond. Artemis Fowl (BCCB 7/01) fans will cheer to see Colfer return at the top of his game. Copyright © 2013 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois
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