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Lost Boy by Christina Henry (spoiler free review)

Lost Boy written by Christina Henry is a re-imagining of Peter Pan and Captain Hook that's suppose to connect to the story we know and love. Jamie (captain hook) was Peter Pan's friend, and would go on many grand adventures with him on the island as a kid. Until he realizes maybe the island isn't the paradise he thought it was, and maybe Peter isn't truly his friend either.

Starting with the good, the concept was what really drew me in. The idea isn't crazy enough to be unrealistic within the confines of the original story of Peter Pan, so seeing a beloved character slowing warped into a monster interested me, but that's not what we got. (more about that in the negatives) Another positive it that the story itself is coherent, while not very descriptive (more about that in the negatives) the story was very easy to read and a quick one too —taking only 2 weeks to read the 400 page book casually.

These two things alone makes it deserves more than one star in my opinion.

Okay, now let's start with the negatives. I'd like to begin by saying that most the negative reviews on this book is due to the violence involving kids. I disagree with this as a complaint because you should of had an idea about this beforehand, looking at the cover alone should give you a hint of the violence to expect. I also think it's unfair to rate an artistic choice such as more realistic brutality so harshly. Rating a book one star for that alone seems unfair. I'd also like to point out that I didn't feel like it was violent just to be violent, but rather to have a point made. Now on to the real criticism.

I will start with the the story itself, what I expected was a slow descent into Peter's madness as the island slowly revealed itself to not be a haven, unfortunately that's not what you get. Right off the bat Peter is crazy and the island is very apparent in its danger. The fact that it takes any kid longer than a week to find the place miserable is beyond me. There is an argument to be made that the kids themselves were worse for wear when found by Peter, but I don’t know, least they weren't in danger of dying constantly. This story could of benefited from a slower buildup to the crazy world these people lived in.

Although this story could of had a slower burn into the insanity of Peter and the danger of the island, what we got was equally as slow, but infinity less interesting. I would say that the first three fourths of the book had really nothing going on, and most of the last fourth was the same. Now don’t get me wrong, things happen but it just feels like nothing really happened. Most of it was just filler, but since it wasn't descriptive the filler didn't even do a good job at world/character building. And in the end it just felt pointless.

Speaking of description there wasn't a lot, leaving many thing to the imagination which isn't necessarily bad but when you give so little then try to describe for example an action scene, it can get very confusing. There are also characters that get no description at all, this doesn't bother me as much but I can see it being a huge negative for others. With the book being so non descriptive it was really easy to fly through the whole thing in only a couple weeks without trying.    

While on the topic of character description, let's talk about the ones that do get described. They are very one dimensional, all of them, and their voices are indistinguishable. The author just cranked the good guy/bad guy dial in the direction she wanted. There is no middle ground, there is no complex characters, and there is no questionable morals at all. Its either good, or bad. Now this doesn't have to be a bad thing necessarily but with the topic and idea this author was going for I feel like it's essential.Now since this is written in the perspective of Jamie, you could say that it's an unreliable narrator, but I very much dislike this argument and I'll explain why in my last point.

Now my final piece of criticism is a big one. The author decided to tell more so than show. Show don't tell is a very important rule and it was broken many times throughout the entire book. Here's an example, the author consistently uses the phrase "gave me a look that's says" or a variation of such. Now doing this is very lazy, because instead of showing the expression or implying the thoughts of said person through action, the author would rather just tell exactly what they are feeling or thinking through a look given to Jamie. Making it sound ridiculous and ruining the immersion many times. The author also liked to use a phrase "knew what BLANK was about," nothing to really say about that, I just thought it was annoying—and don’t get me started when the author said "gave me a look that said that he knew what I was about" ugh. A separate but also very present example is about the characters personalities. Jamie is the protagonist, he is also a Mary Sue. Hes the best fighter, the nicest person, hes fast and smart, and has a heart of gold. Now, why do I say this? Not through his action (although he does act this way most the time) but because he tells you it constantly, over and over. It's not just him that tells you, literally every character in the book let's you know this, even the narcissist Peter Pan. I was so sick of hearing how great Jamie is, I honestly feel that one fifth (if not more) of the words in this book are actually just people talking about how great he is. And its not just him, everything in this book is just repeatedly told to you many times. Is Peter going to do something bad? Well let me tell you many times in one page how I hope he doesn't. Now since this is written from the perspective of Jamie I understand that it could be written like this on purpose, (although it doesn’t make it less annoying to read) Jamie would clearly be bias about himself and how awesome he his right? I disagree and if this was the idea I would be more disappointed in the book than I am already. It would go against what little character development Jamie actually had. Jamie constantly takes on responsibly, and to see him rid all blames and mistakes back on Peter alone, and talk about how great he himself is feels cheap. Especially when I think the message (although not conveyed well) is about how being a grown up is about owning your mistakes and living with them to be a better person.

In summary I unfortunately found this book to be nothing better than a fan-fiction of Peter Pan, was it a bad fan-fiction? Maybe. But it definitely isn't a good one. The theme of the story felt flat and lost and seemed to contradict itself constantly and was never fleshed out satisfyingly. The ending felt forced and rushed, making the ultimately uninspired journey to get there even more disappointing. There’s many more complaints I have with this book, but much of it goes into spoiler territory so I'll end it here. I ultimately don't recommend this book. (3/10☆) 

Thank you for taking the time to read this, hope you enjoyed my thoughts.