Trabajo, trabajo y más trabajo. Linus Baker podría ser una persona cualquiera, en un lugar cualquiera, viviendo una vida cualquiera. Él estaba convencido de esto, y si tú lo hubieras conocido, tampoco habrías dudado en asegurar que Linus pertenecía al montón, ni más, ni menos. Y así era, hasta el día en que este funcionario del Departamento de Jóvenes Mágicos es llamado por Altísima Dirección para supervisar un orfanato del que apenas hay registros.
Con esta nueva tarea entre manos, Linus viajará a la isla de Marsyas, donde deberá …
Trabajo, trabajo y más trabajo. Linus Baker podría ser una persona cualquiera, en un lugar cualquiera, viviendo una vida cualquiera. Él estaba convencido de esto, y si tú lo hubieras conocido, tampoco habrías dudado en asegurar que Linus pertenecía al montón, ni más, ni menos. Y así era, hasta el día en que este funcionario del Departamento de Jóvenes Mágicos es llamado por Altísima Dirección para supervisar un orfanato del que apenas hay registros.
Con esta nueva tarea entre manos, Linus viajará a la isla de Marsyas, donde deberá supervisar a seis huérfanos catalogados como peligrosos (hablamos del futuro Anticristo, entre otros) y a su enigmático cuidador. Ahí, deberá dejar de lado sus miedos y prejuicios, que no son pocos, para darse cuenta de que lo que realmente tiene que hacer no es aquello a lo que le han enviado. Porque en Marsyas, Linus descubrirá que el camino a la felicidad es distinto para cada uno de nosotros, y, que si te atreves a recorrerlo, llegarás al lugar donde te encontrarás a ti mismo.
225 x 145 mm, 496 páginas
Idioma Castellano
Publicado el 26 de abril de 2022 por Crossbooks.
Wunderschöne Geschichte über einen Beamten der aus der Stadt rauskommt und ein Haus an der See. Mehr verrate ich nicht, ist aber eins meiner Lieblingsbücher.
Advertencia de contenido Definitely some spoilers
Good first: the characters were generally pretty charming. The romance was cute and believable. Upbeat, positive, heartwarming.
But ultimately this didn't work for me, for two main reasons. First, the prose style and its overuse of paragraph breaks. To lend some kind of gravitas, I guess. Or to force comedic timing.
I don't know why this bothers me so much. Because it's gimmicky? It's too cutesy and twee? Or maybe—and this ties into the second issue I had with the book—because it feels condescending, like the book is trying to push me into reading it in a specific cadence rather than being confident in its own prose and trusting me as a reader.
"Not trusting the reader" is a decent way to sum up my second, deeper issue. The book is just so didactic and unsubtle, and there's no bigotry in it so bigoted that it can't be resolved or at least stopped short by some grandiose speechifying. The most interesting character in this regard is Helen, the mayor of the town, who has good intentions and comes to understand that she hasn't been bearing them out in her actions. But there's never really any conflict there, and the conflicts that do exist thenceforth get resolved easily by the aforementioned speechifying or by Helen's using her position to browbeat the townsfolk into compliance.
OK, fine. There's a third thing. I won't get into the metaphysics of what it means that Lucy exists, because the book doesn't either, but it seems emblematic of its general shallowness that the main character who is described as non-religious doesn't reckon with that in any way upon finding out that the literal Antichrist literally exists. But also: the threats that these kids pose to the world, excepting Lucy, are just ridiculously oversold. It's the son of the apparently Biblical Satan, whatever that means in a world where being non-religious is an actual thing, and a bunch of random and almost completely harmless little varmints. Why is this Level 4 Classified or whatever?
All in all: heart in the right place, enough charming moments to get me through it, but overall the execution fell flat for me.
Ein wirklich tolles Buch, dass zeigt, dass man mit Glück und etwas Mut aus seiner grauen Blase ausbrechen kann in ein buntes und schönes Leben.
Dette var en morsom og oppfriskende bok med morsomme figurer og et fint budskap. Den var lettlest og egentlig aldri kjedelig. Historien var likevel noe vel forutsigbar og jeg syntes personlighetsutviklinga til hovedpersonen kunne ha vært noe tydeligere. Jeg hadde likt om han hadde vært mye mer usympatisk og negativt innstilt fra begynnelsen, i stedet for forsiktig og deprimert, men det er kanskje også hva jeg skulle ha forventet meg. Jeg synes egentlig også at den var cirka femti sider for lang, men det var en bok som det var verdt å lese for å oppleve de forskjellige figurene mer enn selve handlingen.
Jeg er glad jeg leste den, men det er neppe en bok jeg kommer til å anbefale til så mange.
I was iffy in the beginning and well into the middle, but i cried over children for the last couple of chapters. (Im not sure i actually care that much about any of the adults??)
