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Summary
Summary
Oliver Parker is a ten-year-old American boy miserably trapped in Paris, where his father is stationed as a journalist. Intimidated by his French school and its prickly teachers, oppressed by gray and wintry Paris, and feeling curiously remote from his father--who spends more and more time staring dully into his computer screen--Oliver longs to return to America.
Author Notes
Adam Gopnik is the author of Paris to the Moon and Through the Children's Gate and is a contributor to The New Yorker. He lives in New York City with his wife and two children. His most recent book is Angels and Ages: A Short Book About Darwin, Lincoln and Modern Life, a comparison about how those men changed our nation with their history-making actions.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (3)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-9-A fantasy that is as ambitious in theme, sophisticated in setting, and cosmic in scope as the works of Madeline L'Engle. The unlikely and eponymous hero is Oliver Parker, an 11-year-old American boy living in Paris with his mother and journalist father. After he finds a prize in his slice of cake on the night of Epiphany and dons the customary gilt-paper crown, the boy is plunged into a battle over nothing less than control of the universe. His enemy is the dreaded Master of Mirrors, who rose to power during the reign of Louis XIV, when Parisians developed technology for making sheet glass. This faceless, evil being, capable of capturing souls through mirrors and enslaving them in an alternate world that lies beyond all mirrors, now seeks to dominate the entire universe by mounting a quantum computer on the Eiffel Tower. Oliver's mission is to defeat the Master of Mirrors and save his father's stolen soul. Empowered by the ideas of the French Enlightenment-logic, rhetoric, and his understanding of the difference between irony and metaphor-Oliver is aided by a wild assortment of living allies, along with spirits from the past who dwell in windows, longtime enemies of the Master of Mirrors. Nostradamus, Racine, Moli?re, and Alice Liddell make guest appearances. The story starts slowly, for its complicated and rather far-fetched premises require quite a bit of exposition, but rises to an action-packed climax. The book's strengths are its engaging characters and its lovingly and specifically evoked setting.-Margaret A. Chang, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, North Adams (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Gopnik's (Paris to the Moon, for adults) first offering for young readers is ambitious, complex and overly long. Oliver Parker, 11, an American boy in Paris, is vaguely unhappy. His father, a correspondent for a New York newspaper, is preoccupied; his French schoolmasters exacting, and his closest friend, Neige, sullen. His boredom ends instantly when, wearing the gold-paper crown he won on Epiphany for finding the prize inside a cake, he is mistaken for the monarch of the title, whose destiny is to free the "wraiths" of Versailles. These spirits, French luminaries including Moliere, Racine and the inventor of mayonnaise, have been trapped in the palace's windows for centuries by the evil "Master of the Mirrors." So while Oliver's father is consumed with reporting a story about a computer project soon to be unveiled at the Eiffel Tower, Oliver is engaged in a battle of epic proportions that climaxes at the same tower in the moments before the project's launch. The plot incorporates threads about quantum physics, Alice in Wonderland, skateboarding and 17th-century France's obsession with plate glass. There's wit (e.g., Oliver finds French history confusing since all the kings are named Louis and the only way to tell them apart is by "the style of furniture they liked"), but a lot of it is aimed at adults, as are references to Yoko Ono's singing, wine expert Robert Parker, book royalties, etc. The resolution, though well-orchestrated, is dizzyingly complicated. Think of this as Harry Potter for the Mensa set. Ages 10-up. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Library Journal Review
Something odd has happened to 11-year-old Oliver, an American boy living in Paris. After putting on a golden crown for Epiphany, he catches sight of his reflection and mutters, "Here I am. The King in the Window"-and a boy dressed in 18th-century blue stares back. Fran?ois, it transpires, is a wraith-one of many dwelling in windows and water who enhance our reflections-and he's come to claim Oliver as king of their community, under siege by the soul-stealing Master of Mirrors. Alas, as Oliver learns when he consults grande dame Lucy Pearson, he's been chosen entirely by mistake, and he must use all his wits (not simply his instincts) to triumph. Fortunately, he's helped by gung-ho American buddy Charlie and tart, observant Neige, daughter of the building gardienne. Gopnik, staff writer for The New Yorker, has crafted a first novel as engrossing as it is intellectually stimulating. Even as readers ponder the value of looking out windows rather than at themselves in mirrors and computer screens, they'll discover an entertaining, intricately plotted adventure story whose pages just keep turning. Highly recommended-and not just for children, whatever the cover says. [For an interview with Gopnik, see "Fall Editors' Picks," LJ 9/1/05.-Ed.]-Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.