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The Book of Lost Things

John Connolly (Goodreads Author)

3.96 · Rating details · 66,680 ratings · 7,827 reviews

High in his attic bedroom, twelve-year-old David mourns the death of his mother, with only the books on his shelf for company. But those books have begun to whisper to him in the darkness. Angry and alone, he takes refuge in his imagination and soon finds that reality and fantasy have begun to meld. While his family falls apart around him, David is violently propelled into ...more

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Paperback, 470 pages

Published October 16th 2007 by Washington Square Press (first published November 7th 2006)

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May 12, 2015 Felicia rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, urban-paranormal

This is kind of a deceptive book. It seems like it could be young adult in tone at first but it is NOT young adult. It's an adult urban fantasy starring a child. Very cool and immersive, and a bit dark. Hell, a LOT dark sometimes, haha. The lore is very cool, you can tell that the author really loves folklore and all the elements of the world are interesting and believable. Worth checking out if you like magical realism and a lot of bite to your fairy tales.

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Jan 30, 2010 Stephen rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: books-about-books, darker-than-you-think, audiobook, retellings-reimaginings-and-mashes, mythstories-and-legends, ebooks, fantasy, 2006-2010, ya

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Rumpelstiltskin…aka “the Crooked Man” is one seriously scary and diabolical CREEPSTER.

Trust me, after reading this book, the above image of a sadistic, powerful, child-slaughtering MOFO will forever displace your previous perception of old Rumpy being nothing more than a half pint, mischievous prankster with ethical deficiencies…

…a Disney tale this is not.
…a light, comforting “happily ever after” children’s story this is not.

However, what this story is….is beautifully written, richly ...more

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Jan 08, 2008 Lisa Vegan rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommends it for: everybody, especially those who have used reading to get through challenging times

Shelves: novel, zz-5star, fiction, readbooks-male-author-or-illust, speculative-fiction, goodreads-author, reviewed, books-about-books, fairy-folktales, cancer

Part fairy tale and part psychological study, I found this to be an engrossing and powerful book. Recommend to everybody, particularly those who have used reading and books to get themselves through difficult times, especially in childhood.

I don't look at this book the way some readers apparently have: as sci-fi or fantasy, but instead see it as showing the redemptive power of books and stories in children's and adults' lives. And as an account of one boy's inner life and imagination.

I'm not sur ...more

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Feb 02, 2017 Kai rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Fans of Pan's Labyrinth and Coraline

Shelves: owned, 2017

“For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be.”

This turned out to be a lot darker and crueller than I expected it to be. But in a good way.
Now, if you consider reading this with or to your children: don't. If I had to set an age limit I would say 13 years, at least. This is some real twisted Coraline shit. Don't mistake it for anything else.

It starts off promising but without any hint where it is going. It could have been a historical “For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be.”

This turned out to be a lot darker and crueller than I expected it to be. But in a good way.
Now, if you consider reading this with or to your children: don't. If I had to set an age limit I would say 13 years, at least. This is some real twisted Coraline shit. Don't mistake it for anything else.

It starts off promising but without any hint where it is going. It could have been a historical novel for all I know. Maybe magical realism. Don't let yourself be fooled, this is prime time fantasy.

The writing captured me right away. It created a magical and fairytale atmosphere and pulled me right in. One thing is for sure, John Connolly can write.
A few chapters in, when the main character left reality for the parallel fantasy world, I wasn't sure this magical atmosphere would hold. Suddenly too many things happened at once, the pace increased and new characters were introduced almost every page.
Luckily, Connolly managed to keep the atmosphere from crumbling and built an incredible and dark tale, based on many familiar characters and stories from popular fairytales. Just keep in mind that this is anything but Disney. The author stripped the fairytales of most romanticising aspects and went back to the original and often cruel version of the tales. He gave them his own, sombre twist and developed an exciting and often surprising plot.
(view spoiler)

There are many fairytales out there and many of them include lovely princesses with fancy dresses and beautiful hair. If you are ready to find out what Snow White is really like, or what unspeakable truth lead Red Riding Hood off the path and into the woods, you should make sure to read this book.

P.S.: I'm hoping for Guillermo del Toro to discover this book and adapt it.

Find more of my books on Instagram ...more

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Jul 31, 2017 carol. rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: yuck, fantasy, male-lead, fairy-tale

This is definitely not a young adult book. If you should try, with best intentions, after reading numerous glowing reviews and having heard Connolly's name bandied about the bookish world, to gift this one to a ten-year-old, expect stern words and doubts of judgement. And for pity's sakes, don't give it to any girls, because it's even less friendly to the female person than Grimms' Fairytales. In fact, it does bear a strong resemblance to the writing of the dear Brothers, which is not a been a b This is definitely not a young adult book. If you should try, with best intentions, after reading numerous glowing reviews and having heard Connolly's name bandied about the bookish world, to gift this one to a ten-year-old, expect stern words and doubts of judgement. And for pity's sakes, don't give it to any girls, because it's even less friendly to the female person than Grimms' Fairytales. In fact, it does bear a strong resemblance to the writing of the dear Brothers, which is not a been a bad thing if one enjoys the flagrant telling and the elaborate language of fairy tales. That all generally works beautifully here, except that it's oh-so-very dark and misanthropic a tale that I'd reserve it for grown boys who used to be good and are having trouble figuring the path ahead. Which, as you might have guessed, is also not altogether abhorrent. But, let us speak logically, and dissect this.

"One bottle was filled almost to the top with eyeballs. They seemed alive to David, as though being wrenched from their sockets had not deprived them of the capacity to see. Another contained a woman's hand, a gold ring upon its wedding finger, red varnish flaking slowly from its nails."

It begins with narrative we can all get behind, a long tradition in English country houses and cracks in the garden walls, and a young man--almost adolescent--embarking on an adventure. Except this adventure is framed by three salient grimnesses; the death of his mother, the father remarried/subsequent baby brother, and World War II. This is the adult world with danger, his perceptions of it seeped in negative emotions of loss, jealousy, fear, and sometimes even boredom. He is being stalked by a Crooked Man, who seems evil, though he cannot say exactly why. The young man, David, journeys through the crack and falls into a land that is fairy-tale twisted. Rescued by a Woodsman, he embarks on a journey to see the king, gain insight from The Book of Lost Things and hopefully return to his own world. As the story progresses, he meets different people and occasionally they will tell him stories that echo fairy tales he has read.

"And, in truth, I prefer to hunt children. They make better sport, and better trophies for my wall, for they are beautiful."

A wonderful, traditional format; journey to Oz and to home, but Connolly lets it unwind more than a bit toward the end, as he indulges in descriptions of The Crooked Man's evil deeds, in a way that really doesn't matter to the story, and just serves to point out the horrors of the world. Incest, torture, murder, draining away life; in some ways, I too felt my life drained away by this tale, by the cataloguing of misuse of power, the isolationism of a village, the careless mutilation and torture. Instead of uplifted, I felt ground away, like I had been watching a war montage. Connolly is not celebrating childhood or impending adulthood as much as outlining it as a horrible, dastardly trap where the right choices will mean honor and loss, and the wrong choices mean torture and loss.

And, after all, I have days I feel that way. Where the world has pounded me down. Where humanity seems too full of itself. Where individual kindness feels scarce. Which is why I pick up other books. This is why Catherynne Valente had to write The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making and In the Night Garden, which are almost the exact opposite of this book. This book is indeed about Lost Things, the most lostest being childhood itself, except in this version of childhood, what David leaves behind is fantasies of his mother and his first family, not idle days exploring wardrobes, or playing at sword-fighting, or looking for moon-paths. In this book of childhood, the most halcyon of times were pre-war and pre-illness and so distant as to be barely present.

"Most of the children David knew had by now left the city, thronging train stations with little brown luggage labels tied to their coats on their way to farms and strange towns. Their absence made the city appear emptier and increased the sense of nervous expectancy that seemed to govern the lives of all who remained. Soon, the bombers would come, and the city was shrouded in darkness at night to make their task harder."

Atmosphere is well done, if dark and grim. Characterization is interesting. David is very real, as layered as one can possibly be at that age, struggling with pride, isolation, independence, and a great deal of loss. Most of the rest of the characters exist as they do in fairy tales, that is to say, as archetypes. There is an off-note encounter with the Seven Dwarves, who have become communists; an anomaly in that they are supposed to be humorous. It's also worth nothing that the Gallant Knight is in love with a man, and while a man of honor, is also a doomed, tragic figure.

"David had an opportunity to examine its face as it hovered: it resembled a woman's but was longer and thinner, with a lipless mouth that left its sharp teeth permanently exposed. Now those teeth tore into its prey, ripping great chunks of bloody fur from its body as it fed."

As a final note, to myself and those who follow the humanist footpath: I do not think Connolly loves females overmuch. Because, wow. Aside from the idolized but dead mother, the doomed deer-girl, and a friendly female horse, there is absolutely nothing to love here about females. I'm going to list it here, because I'm not going to ever re-read this book, and someday, someone will ask why: the dead mother. (view spoiler)

One of the most beautiful, happiest passages in the book:

"Stories were different, though: they came alive in the telling. Without a human voice to read them aloud, or a pair of wide-eyes following them by flashlight beneath a blanket, they had no real existence in our world. They were like seeds in the beak of a bird, waiting to fall to earth, or the notes of a song laid out on a sheet, yearning for an instrument to bring their music into being. They lay dormant, hoping for the chance to emerge. Once someone started to read them, they could begin to change. They could take root in the imagination, and transform the reader."

Absolutely beautiful, and absolutely true. It came alive to me, but not in a pleasant way, more in the way of being lost in a forest and arriving at a town where nobody speaks your language and everyone looks at you askance, and you feel you may not be safe after all, which is why on my own personal scale, it's about an 'okay.' On the technical side, I'd say it's a four star, meaning generally well written, lovely use of language, recognizable themes, consistent story. All that said, it's not a book I'd ever give and would recommend to only a few. ...more

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Aug 06, 2008 Annet rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, dark, weird

Extraordinary book, really special.
Story about the seven dwarves made me laugh :-)

Magical book! I have my eyes on Nocturnes now of Connolly.

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Oct 23, 2011 mark monday rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: legendarium, fantasy-modern, time-to-come-of-age

Fugue state, formally Dissociative Fugue... usually involves unplanned travel or wandering, and is sometimes accompanied by the establishment of a new identity. Fugues are usually precipitated by a stressful episode.

in world war 2-era england, young David loses his mother after a lingering illness and begins to experience strange dissociative episodes, often involving the sounds of books whispering to him and usually ending with him falling into unconsciousness. soon enough, his father finds a n Fugue state, formally Dissociative Fugue... usually involves unplanned travel or wandering, and is sometimes accompanied by the establishment of a new identity. Fugues are usually precipitated by a stressful episode.

in world war 2-era england, young David loses his mother after a lingering illness and begins to experience strange dissociative episodes, often involving the sounds of books whispering to him and usually ending with him falling into unconsciousness. soon enough, his father finds a new wife named Rose - a nurse at his mother's hospice - and David finds himself with a stepmother and an infant half-brother. David is deeply unhappy with this development. after the new family moves out of london to Rose's country home in order to escape german bombers, David realizes a shadowy, crooked figure has sinister designs on him and his brother. one night, after a particularly bad argument with his folks, David hears his mother's voice calling him. following that voice, he crawls into a hole within a sunken garden - just as a german bomber also falls from the sky and crashes into that garden. he emerges into a sinister fantasyland. his quest: Find and Rescue His Mother. his nemesis: The Crooked Man.

John Connolly is best known as a respected writer of an excellent detective series. his strengths have been widely reported: gorgeously dark and lush descriptive skills, a sensitive portrayal of private eye Charlie Parker - an unusually tormented protagonist (tragic even for a genre noted for its sad, sad heroes), and a unsettling ability to mix the prosaic with the supernatural to startling effect. in this book, Connolly takes each of those gifts and streamlines them in a way that is appropriate for the reader of young adult or even children's literature - although this novel is very clearly an Adult Fairy Tale. the result is pleasingly distinctive. there are many scenes that are striking in their psychosocial nuance, their foreboding atmosphere, their ability to evoke that wonderfully shivery feeling of fearful anticipation. my favorite passage happens early on: David's daunting entry into the strange fantasy world... an eerie vignette that is a model of careful, suspenseful writing, featuring unearthly quiet, child-like flowers, a a taciturn Woodsman, the smoking remains of the german bomber, bleeding trees, a house in the woods with a Giger-like exterior, and a gathering of evil wolfish beings.

Dionysian imitatio, a literary method of imitation conceived as the practice of emulating, adaptating, reworking and enriching a source text by an earlier author.

Book of Lost Things is a book of mythopoeic templates - revisited, revised, regurgitated, remixed, and reimagined. we have an entire company of Big Bad Wolves, reconfigured as ambitious wolf-men, born of a grotesquely slutty Little Red Hood and sprung from the nightmares of a juvenile king... a perhaps not-so-Wicked Stepmother... a malevolent and terrifying Sleeping Beauty... Childe Roland, transformed as a brave gay soldier in search of his long-lost lover... trolls and harpies and a savage, hungry Beast... a young girl's spirit in a glass jar... and our villain, a gleeful child-thief, a striker of dark bargains, a Rumpelstiltskin, an old old devil: The Crooked Man.

the use of revisionism is, sadly, not always successful. a comic interlude with the socialist Seven Dwarves and an obese, monstrous Snow White is depressingly unfunny and a little desperate (at least to this reader). and a long part near the end, depicting various torture chambers and examples of The Crooked Man's terrible villainy seems to be merely an excuse for Connolly to indulge himself with a gloatingly vicious array of sadistic tableau. both sequences were eye-rolling and sigh-inducing.

but those are aberrations; despite them, Connolly more than succeeds in creating delightful and intriguing reinterprations of figures from fairy and folk tale. even better, David's character is a slow-burning but dynamic one, changing in bits and starts from boy to man with each new encounter. he is a realistically flawed protagonist as well as a brave and endearing little hero.

Memento mori, a Latin phrase translated as "Remember your mortality", "Remember you must die" or "Remember you will die"... it names a genre of artistic work which varies widely, but which all share the same purpose: to remind people of their own mortality.

the novel's extended endings were a brilliant surprise. to avoid spoilers, i'll just say that i was entirely taken aback by the meaning of The Book of Lost Things itself. and - even more memorably, more intensely - the closing pages' no-nonsense illustration of the potential and/or inherent tragedy of human life in general... and the idea of that tragedy - no matter how intimate - somehow not really being that tragic at all - just simply a part of the greater cycle of life, death, and rebirth.

i hate to end a review with a tv show reference... but if you have ever seen the last 10 minutes or so of Six Feet Under's final episode - a wondrously sad, wistful, yet somehow uplifting experience - you will know exactly what i mean. the ending of this rather fantastic book is equally moving. ...more

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Nov 14, 2011 Mith rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: young-adult, fantasy, fairy-tales, love-the-cover, horror, i-needz-moar, retellings

I stayed up till 1 last night to finish this book.

I REGRET NOTHING.

Recently I've taken quite a fancy to fairy tale re-tellings. You can go right ahead and blame Gail Carson Levine for that. The Book of Lost things belongs to that genre, albeit a ~~bit~~ LOT more darker.

The book begins by introducing us to 12-year old David who has just lost his mum. He finds out that his dad is getting remarried and pretty soon finds himself with a baby brother, whom he hates on sight. Deep in his depression, he be ...more

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Nov 15, 2017 Rosh rated it liked it · review of another edition

*Didn't like this book as much but it did motivate me to sketch* Didn

Take all your favourite fairy tales from your childhood(from odd mixture of Wizard of Oz to Labyrinth to The Never Ending Story to the most sadistic part of Grimm's Fairy Tales), now throw in some well known poems and mix together with a story of a child coming to terms with the death of a parent. And you've pretty much got this. But did it work?

description

This books is rather dichotomous. There were some really wonderful bits, and there were ...more

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Mar 09, 2008 Robotkarateman rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: modern-fantasy

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
NOTICE (Please read this first): I'm happy to discuss my opinion of this book with you if you had a different take, but if your intent is merely to attack my opinion, I'm not interested.

Since I posted this way back in 2008, a (very) small minority of this book's fans have taken my review personally and have written some very long, very insulting responses telling me why I'm wrong. So please allow me to clarify something -

This is my opinion of the book. It will undoubtedly differ from yours bec ...more

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Jun 24, 2018 Lyn rated it liked it · review of another edition

Fable like, but not YA.

John Connolly’s 2006 revisionist fantasy will draw many comparisons due to it’s fable / mythical themes. Most notably will be a comparison to CS Lewis’ Narnia books since this is set in England during WWII and our young protagonist finds his way into an alternate world. It’s alternate fairy tales will also draw comparison to both Gregory Maguire and L. Frank Baum. The urban fantasy parts made me also think of Charles de Lint’s fine work.

Because of the youthful hero and the ...more

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Nov 29, 2015 James rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: 2-fic-young-adult, 1-fiction, 2-fic-fantasy-and-scifi

4 stars to John Connolly's The Book of Lost Things. I added this to my "To Read" list sometime in 2015 as it reminded me a little bit of the "Once Upon a Time" TV series which I love. And it didn't disappoint!

Story
A young adult novel focusing on a young boy's quest to fit in his earthly world and survive in his fantasy world in 1940's England. Young David (around 10) has suffered a lot as a boy. His mother dies early, his father remarries quickly. He is shy and doesn't venture much out of hi ...more

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Sep 27, 2016 Chesca (thecrownedpages) rated it it was amazing

Shelves: general-fiction, read-in-2016, books-i-highly-recommend, historical-fiction, fantasy, owned-books

“For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be.”

John Connolly’s The Book of Lost Things is a tale that reflects everyone’s story of growing up. Some would say that it’s a story of losing one’s innocence, but are we ever really innocent? Through time we have come to develop feelings of grief, rage, hatred, and jealousy. These are some of the things that eat the pure off of us. At some point, we have all become the things w
“For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be.”

John Connolly’s The Book of Lost Things is a tale that reflects everyone’s story of growing up. Some would say that it’s a story of losing one’s innocence, but are we ever really innocent? Through time we have come to develop feelings of grief, rage, hatred, and jealousy. These are some of the things that eat the pure off of us. At some point, we have all become the things we feared the most. We have turned into our very own monsters, destroying the good that is ahead of us. This is the story of how David overcame his monsters.

As a young boy, David lost his mother, and his only means of coping up with his grief was reading, an interest he got from her. The books started whispering to him and only he could hear them. Months after his beloved mother’s death, his father remarried. Rose, his father’s new love got pregnant with Georgie, David’s new half-brother. As a part of starting a new life with his step-mother and half-brother, David and his father moved out of their London home and into Rose’s which was located out of the city. There, in the old house, he was given a room that was used to be of a boy named Jonathan Tulvey. It was filled with old books that David tried to read for himself although some he could not understand thoroughly.

In his dreams and around the house, David began seeing a figure of a man with distinct, odd features. Drawing closer and closer to him, waiting in the shadows, was the Crooked Man.

I borrowed a copy of this from my cousin and it had been sitting on my shelf for months. At first, I was not too thrilled to start reading it due to the synopsis at the back of the book. It was not very attractive to me. I decided to read it just so I could return it to her sooner. I was so wrong to judge this book by the few words written on its back cover. I was not expecting it to fascinate me, to touch my heart, and to show me what it means to live and to be alive, but it did. It was an extraordinary experience that was beyond my anticipation for it. The synopsis didn’t do it justice. It was a dark, strange, tragic, and bloody adventure that every child in us would fear, but the adult in us would come to understand the truth beneath its surface. In it are very familiar tales that were distorted to suit the book’s eeriness, constructing a twisted realm parallel to David’s reality.

David was a child at the beginning of the story, and you could really visualize how his character developed. He became more mature as he learned to decide what’s right and what’s wrong. In time, he also became more selfless, learning that love could cause a terrible ache, and living, sometimes, could hurt. His journey in the world beyond the sunken garden emblematized a lot of things that he was battling in his heart. They were struggles he had to face to help him cope with the pain of losing his mother and adjust to his new life.

The world that the author wrote into being was quite disturbing. It was stripped off of peace, innocence, and hope. In every corner of it lurked danger that a child like David, realistically, might not be able to endure. I don’t even think adults could come out alive of the situations David found himself in. There were beasts, creatures that could kill or mangle you. There was also a bit of sexual content implied in it that I was not expecting. It was not graphic, but it would be perturbing if a very young child would mistaken this as a children’s book and read it. He could either be very curious to try those things out or be afraid of them.

A hundred pages on the origin stories and source materials were included in the latter part of the book, explaining further how each distorted tale woven into The Book of Lost Things represented something significant in David’s life. It gave me a clearer insight of what David was going through, reminding me more that, somehow, I have been there too. It was quite amusing to reread those fairytales and to read some of them for the first time. They felt familiar but at the same time strange because after all these years of not reading them and then revisiting them now, it seemed to me that they were telling a different story that exhibited deeper reason than how I perceived them when I was just a child. There were also explanations on how each of the characters represented an archetype or a persona that contributed greatly not only to the development of this story, but also to those that inspired it.

This is a really cleverly-written adventure and I highly recommend it. I hope you guys would give it a try. Surely, I will be reading more books written by this author in the future. ...more

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May 27, 2017 Kawther rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, messed-my-feelings, fun-read, taught-me-a-lot-made-me-think, villain-approved, magic-fairy

“For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be.”
― John Connolly,

description

I love the cover of this book, isn't it so gorgeous ??

This book is my favorite book of all time. I love getting back to it every once in a while and reread few passages, i feel it pulling me back in, tempting me to dive in its beautiful world of adventures once again. so finally i decided to post my thoughts about it.

One thing you should know about me, is that I LOVE ...more

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Aug 08, 2017 Ron rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, suspense-thriller

Held within this book are not the fairy tales I heard as a child. They surely would have messed me up if I had. Connolly creates something wholly fresh by weaving a new fantasy with old tales placed in the mix – with a twist that is twisted mind you. It is the story of David lost in another land, and his journey to find a way home.

4 stars for scaring the child in me…for making me wonder, cringe and also laugh as an adult reader…for the adventure of it, and the heartfelt story inside all of this. ...more

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Jul 19, 2017 Hannah rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy

I am as surprised as anyone about my rating - I genuinely thought I would adore this book. So much in fact that I kept putting off reading it to ensure I'd get the most of it. On the surface, this book is perfect for me as it combines many of my favourite things: fairy tales, hidden worlds, adult books with children as the lenses through which to see these hidden worlds, re-tellings, a sibling relationship that feels real, imaginative world building and and and.

Don't get me wrong, this book was I am as surprised as anyone about my rating - I genuinely thought I would adore this book. So much in fact that I kept putting off reading it to ensure I'd get the most of it. On the surface, this book is perfect for me as it combines many of my favourite things: fairy tales, hidden worlds, adult books with children as the lenses through which to see these hidden worlds, re-tellings, a sibling relationship that feels real, imaginative world building and and and.

Don't get me wrong, this book was perfectly alright; it is very readable and well-plotted. The characters and their relationships make sense, the world created is interesting, and the fairy tales are well integrated. I am still dissappointed because it could have been SO much better.

We follow David who is mourning his mother and feels betrayed that his father has found a new wife and had a child with her. He starts having seizures and seeing and hearing strange things until he finds himself in a new world - a world so very strange but still familiar, one where he has to fear for his life and will have to be braver than he has ever been.

See, that sounds just like my type of book. Maybe my expecation just were too high and I was hoping for it to be more like "Pan's Labyrinth" - one of my all-time favourite movies. I thought the atmosphere could have been developed better to more work with the world detailed. I found the language to be too simplistic or not simplistic enough, I am not sure - if you are going to use different fairy tales to weave your tapestry your language needs to mirror those very closely or not at all. I reckon I caught most allusions to different fairy tales - I did grow up reading fairy tales, again and again and again - and this might actually have been one of my problems. The world felt very familiar to me and as such never completely original (I know that originality wasn't the point, I still think it could have been fresher).

So yeah, kind of dissappointed but still a very readable book.

First sentence: Once upon a time - for that is how all stories should begin - there was a boy who lost his mother. ...more

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Nov 29, 2019 Hamad marked it as lost-interest · review of another edition

The only Lost Thing is my interest in this book unfortunately...

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Oct 28, 2018 Lisa rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: children

"I think the act of reading imbues the reader with a sensitivity toward the outside world that people who don't read can sometimes lack. I know it seems like a contradiction in terms; after all reading is such a solitary, internalizing act that it appears to represent a disengagement from day-to-day life. But reading, and particularly the reading of fiction, encourages us to view the world in new and challenging ways...It allows us to inhabit the consciousness of another which is a precursor to ...more

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Aug 11, 2017 Bill Khaemba rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: horror-scary, mystery, atmospheric-books, highly-rated-books, historical-fiction, young-adult, fantasy-epic-magic-adventure

Coming off from reading Lord of The Flies, I can definitely see some underlining similarities in both of them in the sense that both authors chose to use children to get their points across in a dark deeply disturbing way. Both backgrounds were hostile and unnerving and some imagery will stay with me for a while.

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“For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be.”

The book follows David a young boy who is trying to cope with a family trag ...more

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Dec 15, 2017 Fran rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy, young-adult, dark-fantasy

While many refer to this book as dark fantasy, I don't think it's particularly dark. So, I'm more inclined to include it with other fairy tale re-tellings.

While the story in itself is original, it does follow the classic kidnapping-rescue format of fairy tales involving boogies and other members of the Unseely Court (the mischievous or just plain evil side of the faery family). Moreover, as the narrative advances, new explanations and interpretations are given to traditional tales hence creatin ...more

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May 23, 2014 Karina rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, read-in-2014

A fairytale turned nightmare. I loved this!
First off, let me tell you that this is not something for the faint of heart. Some passages were definitely scary or just plain twisted and gross (think bad witch cutting off children's heads and putting them on animals to then hunt them..). I want to get that out of the way because the word fairytale can be misleading. Those elements in the story were used sparingly though and never took over the story to the point were it turned into the horror genre A fairytale turned nightmare. I loved this!
First off, let me tell you that this is not something for the faint of heart. Some passages were definitely scary or just plain twisted and gross (think bad witch cutting off children's heads and putting them on animals to then hunt them..). I want to get that out of the way because the word fairytale can be misleading. Those elements in the story were used sparingly though and never took over the story to the point were it turned into the horror genre.
David, the main character, is a young boy who has just lost his mother. That event triggered something in him and he experiences seizures and is suddenly able to hear his books whisper and talk. The angrier he gets at his father for starting to live and marry again the more he experiences the real world and the world of stories blurring... until he becomes a part of one. He completely disappears into a world next to our own and has to find his way back. Of course, evil powers are trying to prevent him from doing so. It's a fairytale itself after all.
The overall atmosphere is dark and scary. I was not expecting it to be for an older audience, but that is how it read for me. Looking at the cover I was expecting it to almost lean towards the middle grade genre. The twisted and scary parts of the story are not something I would recommend to someone of that age though. There are plenty of well-known fairytales mentioned that make it fun for someone who has been exposed to them over the years, but they have been turned into their nightmare version.
The little red riding hood, for example, lays with a wolf she had followed through the woods and through their encounter an evil wold-human hybrid comes into existence. On the other hand, the chapter about Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs is plain hilarious. She is an arrogant, awful and high maintenance young woman and the dwarfs feel so oppressed that they have turned into communists. You have to read in order to really appreciate this crazy storyline haha
I enjoyed a lot and highly recommend this to people who are in for a dark, twisted, and edgy version of a fairytale retelling. ...more

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Apr 06, 2009 karen rated it liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: continuations-n-retellings, books-about-books-about-books

this was fine. i think i expected it to be a little more grown-up than it was. in many ways i am a huge infant, but not so much in my reading, unless its reeeally young reader picture books. but this had some nice reimaginings of traditional fairy tales, and it certainly doesnt take long to read, so i recommend to those adults that are already reading the harry potters and twilights. you babies!

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Oct 29, 2007 Lori rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: fricken-awesome

Read this book without really knowing too much about it. Just that other reviewers were impressed and it centered around a little boy and some dark versions of fairy tales that I had grown up on.

Wow.

Wow.wow.wow.

That is what I have to say when I got to the last page.
It was a really really great story. 10 year old boy who loves to read, loses his mother, hates his new stepmother and stepbrother.... gets pulled into this fairy tale world where things are familiar yet somewhat strange. Evil lurks ar ...more

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Jun 23, 2016 Carlos rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Oh wow , what can I say? This book destroyed me, this book surpassed my expectations for it , I picked this up thinking it was going to be just a vapid book but boy this it's so much more that it's blurb would let you to believe. Think Grimm brothers, Disney , folk and fairy tales , ya modern literature (I'll compare it to a monster calls) and you will get a glimpse at the work that went behind this book. Then ending would make you feel all the feelings ..... I will not soon forget this book!!!

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Aug 07, 2017 Liz rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

I loved this story. Fantastical adventures, battles, castles, monsters, magicians, heroes, and foes. There was so much more than I expected in this book -- which is billed as YA, yet of which I remain unconvinced -- but none of those things are even the best part. What moved me the most was the story of David himself, and the evolution of his character.

David is a twelve year old boy who is grieving the loss of his mother and struggling to accept the upheaval of his life. And he’s angry… who wou ...more

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Apr 18, 2012 Mark rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Recommended to Mark by: Kasia!

Shelves: k-m

This was me after finishing this novel, my first read from John Connolly:

description

It was so gut-wrenchingly emotional. Every bit of it. From the harrowing beginning, to the Labyrinth-on-acid fantasy world in which the main character soon finds himself.

There's so much going on in this novel. It seems like a children's fairy tale, but if I had read this as a young'un, I would probably be in an insane asylum to this day. I know Connolly typically writes crime fiction and this being my first, I'm unable to ...more

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Jul 25, 2013 Mimi rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommends it for: connoisseurs of dark fairy tales

Shelves: 2016, 2014, favorites, my-shelf, fairytales, contemporary-fantasy

A children's book not suitable for children should be a tagline somewhere on the cover because it's necessary.

That aside, I really like this book and John Connolly's writing. Fairy tale retelling is one of those things I stay away from because in general these stories are either not well conveyed or they don't bring anything new to a classic narrative or they rely too much on the existing tale and world to carry the book. Also, I find many retellings boring and predictable, not because I already ...more

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Dec 21, 2007 Rachel rated it it was ok · review of another edition

I picked this up blindly and bought it from the description on the book jacket alone. I wish I'd liked it more; rather, I wish it'd been better-executed.

My main trouble was with the telling-not-showing style of writing. In the words of Twain, "Don’t say 'the old lady screamed.' Bring her on and let her scream." The turbulence of David's inner life ends up muffled by the flat and dispassionate narrative ("He experienced a wave of pity for the dead man...", "He was still angry at God for what had ...more

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Apr 15, 2014 pink (not just another shade of red) rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: for-adults-also, own-a-copy, all-the-26-book-challengr, favorites, 5star-ratings, fairytale-retellings, coming-of-age

According to Alice Hoffman, every fairy tale had a bloody lining. Everyone had teeth and claws.
This one got fangs. And razor-sharp claws.

It will lure you in with promises of magical books and mysterious flowers. Then, when it has you firmly in it's grasp, it will suck you in deeper into the dark. And won't let you go until it has its way with you.

In Book of Lost Things, John Conolly collected fragments of my beloved bed time stories,twisted them so crookedly,and made them ornaments to a dark,bea ...more

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Jan 21, 2008 Kim rated it it was ok · review of another edition

Shelves: meh-at-you, gr-friend-recommendations

This is why I don't read the front jacket of books. I get sucked in thinking 'wow--this makes a good story'. Hmphf.

Okay, it's not a bad story. It had its moments. But, it lost me when it started twisting fairy tales to be all sorts of clever. Snow White as a hefty, insult laden uber wench? yeah. whatever.

The story outside of these sidebars is actually quite interesting, a boy's journey in a strange land, grieving over his dead mom, etc... but I still found myself wondering what those dudes that ...more

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About John Connolly

John Connolly

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John Connolly was born in Dublin, Ireland in 1968 and has, at various points in his life, worked as a journalist, a barman, a local government official, a waiter and a dogsbody at Harrods department store in London. He studied English in Trinity College, Dublin and journalism at Dublin City University, subsequently spending five years working as a freelance journalist for The Irish Times newspaper ...more

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Dragons, demons, kings, queens, and the occasional farm boy (with a special destiny, of course): Fantasy literature has it all! To celebrate...

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“For in every adult there dwells the child that was, and in every child there lies the adult that will be.” — 732 likes

“I think the act of reading imbues the reader with a sensitivity toward the outside world that people who don't read can sometimes lack. I know it seems like a contradiction in terms; after all reading is such a solitary, internalizing act that it appears to represent a disengagement from day-to-day life. But reading, and particularly the reading of fiction, encourages us to view the world in new and challenging ways...It allows us to inhabit the consciousness of another which is a precursor to empathy, and empathy is, for me, one of the marks of a decent human being.” — 432 likes

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