I am now reading a book entitled Märchenmond, by Wolfgang and Heike Hohlbein. There is an English translation available entitled Magic Moon, though "Märchen" is actually the German word for a fairy tale.
I suppose something needed to knock German children's fantasy off the pedestal I had put it on. Kai Meyer = Amazing. Cornelia Funke, same. Michael Ende (of The Neverending Story) as well. The Hohlbeins...
It isn't bad. Just so-so. The story tells of a boy who is ten(?), whose four(?) year old sister is in a coma. A mysterious old man appears and tells him that his sister's spirit is trapped in the magical world Märchenmond by an evil sorcerer, and so the boy, Kim, has to travel there to get her back.
My critique as follows:
1) Kim, the hero, is established immediately as a sci-fi reader. However, as soon as he enters Märchenmond, this fact is forgotten (though he did have to get there by flying a spaceship). Regardless, unless the authors are trying to pull a Neverending story where the magical world is causing him to lose his memory, they are wasting a great opportunity for some wrong genre savvy conflicts.
2) Even though Kim knows nothing about fantasy worlds, he should know better not to let the army of Black Knights take him anywhere without asking them a few questions. Or drinking an unidentified substance given to him by them, though it seems not to have done any lasting harm. In fact, he adapts almost too well to be believed.
3) Yes, it is a fantasy story, which requires a bit of suspension of disbelief. Perhaps it is reasonable that he managed to knock out a Knight and steal his armor and horse and travel undetected with the Black Army for, what, over a week? I mean, evil minions aren't expected to be bright. And okay, maybe he wouldn't quite die of starvation from not eating because he was too afraid to take off his visor even for an instant. But that begs the question - if he does not take off his armor for a week, how does he take care of certain functions? There is a line between no one really wants to read about it, and you kind of have to wonder...
4) I'm really not sure what kind of person Kim is. Probably he is supposed to be an Everyman with a Hero Complex. It's entirely possible that I am merely missing subtlety by reading a book in a foreign language, but Kim seems to be a very generic protagonist. Sister in danger? Go rescue her, without a care for the danger. Magical world in danger? Go rescue it. Plus, the only characters that seemed to give him any development were one-shots (or possibly Chekhov's Gunmen).
Example: As Kim flees the evil citadel, he is conveniently rescued by a swamp-prince, Ado. Ado asks to join Kim on his quest, but Kim tells him to stay in the swamp where he is needed. First off, where did that bit of insight come from? Personally, I find that Ado would have given Kim a lot more character development than the WTF companions he ended up with - a gentle giant and a grouchy bear, neither of which are very bright or have much personality. So we don't get to see Kim's (presumeably) rational and caring demeanor contrasted with a rash and heedless best friend, but rather a hero surrounded by bumbling mistfit companions.
In short, this is the sort of story that blindly binds itself to genre constraints and does not even have any interesting side characters, cool scenery, or beautiful prose to make up for it. Granted it was written in the eighties and seems to be a nostalgia piece for many, but I am nearly halfway through and as yet have not seen anything remarkable about it. Besides the above remarks.
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