Around Christmas time, I bought myself a present in the form of a book that I was super excited about. I have devoured all of Ransom Riggs' Peculiar Children novels and couldn't wait to read the newest installment, especially considering that I'd assumed the last one to be the final installment. As soon as I finished the book I'd been reading before, I jumped right into this and thoroughly enjoyed the ride.
by Ransom Riggs
(Dutton, 2018)
At the end of the last book, the saga in Devil's Acre may have ended, but as this novel reveals, Jacob Portman's journey into the depths of the peculiar universe are just beginning. This is clearly the beginning of a new story, the start of a new trilogy (presumably). In that regard, this feels very similar in pace and scope as the very first book. It's also a new beginning in many ways, relying very little on the events of the past three books to establish and build the story.
As the story opens, Jacob finds himself back in Florida with his family of normals who are completely convinced he's somewhat insane. Luckily, his has another family, one that knows all about being peculiar. Arriving seemingly out of nowhere, Miss Peregrine and his friends arrive at his home. It turns out, a lot has happened in Acre in the short time Jacob has been gone. The result of what happened in the Library of Souls has enabled the children who were there to move freely from loop to the loop in the present without aging forward.
The book gets off to a bit of a slow start as far as the action is concerned. It's only a third of the way through that Jacob, Emma, and the rest the crew discover Jacob's grandfather's best kept secrets and decide to disobey the council of ymbrynes and strike out on their own in the peculiar wilds of America. They quickly learn that American loops operate dramatically differently than the ones they are used to. The threat from the dangers they are used to may be gone, this new landscape is populated with many other dangers that threaten them at every turn.
While this book reads like a simple action/adventure story for most of the story, by the last third, it explodes into a vastness of story that will certainly fill many, many books and leaves the reader dying for more.
My one criticism is the very dry way in which Jacob and Emma's relationship is related. Romance is certainly not the author's strong point, but thankfully it's not a large part of the story.
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