YA Review: The Falcon's Malteser, by Anthony Horowitz

-
224516



Title: The Falcon's Malteser: A Diamond Brothers Mystery
Author: Anthony Horowitz
Publisher: Philomel Books, 1986
Source: Library

Publisher's Summary:
When the vertically-challenged Johnny Naples entrusts Tim Diamond with a package worth over three million pounds, he’s making a big mistake. Tim Diamond is the worst detective in the world. Next day, Johnny’s dead, Tim feels the heat, and his smart younger brother, Nick, gets the package—and every crook in town on his back!

My Review:
This is a pretty good mystery/thriller, with one foot in comedy and one foot in mayhem. The body count is high, making it definitely YA, not children's, and if it weren't for the somewhat cartoonish nature of the whole thing it would have been too violent for my taste. It might be, anyway. What's awkward is that the writing level feels more like it's for 10- or 11-year-olds. Maybe today's kids are used to corpses from the video games?


Nick Diamond is a pretty sharp kid, unlike his brother. He's pretty convinced of his brilliance, too, which makes him an entertaining narrator, in a way. At least, it's sort of entertaining to see him discover that he's not as smart as he thinks he is. Horowitz's tongue-in-cheek version of the hard-boiled detective-story style is more fun, as is the play on names that starts with the title and doesn't stop. The story is fast-moving, the writing clever and smooth, and after the half-way point I just sat back and read to see where it would go.

There's nothing fundamentally wrong with the book, and I almost stopped reading halfway through. I think that the style simply felt too adolescent to me, and the combination of the absurd with the corpse on every third page wasn't my thing. I really did feel torn--fun one minute, disturbing the next.

Recommendation:
I'm not sure what age the book is meant for (I notice that our library puts it in Young Adult, not juvvy, probably because of the body count). I'd say it's for somewhat older kids (high school) who want a fun, easy read that doesn't feel like a kiddie book but dodges the romance that seems to be a part of most YA novels. I wouldn't give it to little kids--to me, the cartoon violence is worse than the real violence that is in many kids' books (especially some of the historical fiction set in troubled times). Adults familiar with Dashiell Hammet and Raymond Chandler will probably enjoy the parody.

FTC Disclosure: I checked The Falcon's Malteser out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."  

Comments

Post a Comment

Let us know what you think! We love to hear from our readers!

Popular Posts

Non-fiction Audiobook Review: Falter, by Bill McKibben

-
Image
Important stuff, but hard to hear. Title: Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out? Author: Bill McKibben. Ready by Olivery Wyman Publication Info: Macmillan Audio 2019. 11 hours. Hardback by Henry Holt & Co., 291 pages. Source: Library Blurb: (Goodreads): Thirty years ago Bill McKibben offered one of the earliest warnings about climate change. Now he broadens the warning: the entire human game, he suggests, has begun to play itself out. Bill McKibben’s groundbreaking book The End of Nature -- issued in dozens of languages and long regarded as a classic -- was the first book to alert us to global warming. But the danger is broader than that: even as climate change shrinks the space where our civilization can exist, new technologies like artificial intelligence and robotics threaten to bleach away the variety of human experience. Falter tells the story of these converging trends and of the ideological fervor that keeps us from bringing them under control. And t
Read more

#WEP--The Scream

-
Image
WEP challenges are FREE and open to all. On the 1st   of the challenge month, there will be a   get-your-thinking-caps   on post. The badge will include the dates of the challenge and the winner’s   prizes. The InLinkz sign up will open on the third Wednesday and close 3 days later. It will contain no news, just the sign up. Participants link up with their DLs (Direct Links to their entry).  Learn all about it here .    My entry this time is based on an actual incident. Mom and my brothers will recognize it. My apologies to them for the non-trivial liberties I took with history and their personalities. We are now also meant to provide a tag line for our stories, so here's mine: What terrors lurk in the root cellar?     The Scream The house we lived in that year wasn’t much. The wind blew in everywhere you could imagine a draft, and some places you couldn’t. The old enclosed porch we used as a root cellar was worse. It wasn’t just the wind that could get in through the chinks a
Read more

#WEP: December Flash Fiction Challenge

-
Image
This December challenge wraps up the year of artistic inspiration from some great works of art. The WEP is open to all, following the simple rules: 1. SUBMIT your name to the list below on December 1 thru the 15th . Add your link (URL) 2. POST your entry, put WEP is in the TITLE along with The Narcissus badge within your entry. 3. STATE feedback preferences and word count at the end of your entry. 4. READ other entries, giving feedback if requested. 5. SHARE THE CHALLENGE on social media. Tweets are ready on the WEP blog. PLEASE NOTE: ENTRIES CLOSE Dec. 15th @ midnight (NY Time - check WEP blog clock) ALL GENRES WELCOME except erotica - 1,000 words maximum My story for this month's challenge is maybe cheating a little--I didn't write it for the challenge, but I decided that the common understanding of Narcissus and narcissism fits well enough, even if the story doesn't relate to the painting. I wrote this while trekking in Nepal last month, highlighting a character w
Read more