The Puppet Master

The Charlie Small Journal #3

by Charlie Small

No one knows the full story of Charlie Small. At least, not yet. His original battered journal was found washed up on a remote, windswept shore in the north of England. The second, encased in ice on a glacial plateau in the Himalayas. At first we thought they were part of some elaborate hoax. Surely no eight-year-old could have had so many wild adventures, witnessed so many extraordinary things, lived such an incredible life - and still only be eight. And yet...there was something so vivid in the telling, that we were pursuaded, just enough, to send the journals and their boggling content for analysis. Now, gentleman adventurer Nick Ward has tracked down a third installment of Charlie's incredible life-story. The battered journal was found beneath the seat of a bus shelter in Pimlico. Passed into the hands of a collector of dubious repute, it took swift work from Nick to prevent the story vanishing forever. Fans of Charlie, old and new, will be so glad he did, because this book is an action-packed ripsnorter! Having finally escaped from the perfidious pirates, Charlie travels through icy waters and hair-raising mountains and encounters man-eating bats, a wolf whose bark is worse than his bite, and ultimately finds himself ensnared by the evil Puppet Master, a figure of pure unadulterated evil. Will Charlie manage to escape his clutches, or will he remain a puppet for ever, never to adventure again? Only by reading his extraordinary diaries will you find out...

Genres: Childrens, Fiction

Paperback

First published August 2, 2007

Reviews

[John Naylor · Rating 3 out of 5]

I haven't read any prequels or sequels to this. I have to assume they all will be similar.

Charlie Small is 400 years old. He is also 8 years old. I feel accepting this will help a reader. He has a tendency to get into awkward and dangerous situations. Sometimes on every page he finds a new one. This does feel a little repetitive by the middle of the book.

The perils are well crafted and the author does add in some evocative language which is better than a lot of books aimed at this audience manages. There are also a lot of references back in the book which did make me feel that you need to pay attention to everything.

I enjoyed this as a read while also finding it repetitive. I would read more in the series given the chance and recommend it to the 8-13 year old audience as it contains peril but not in a horrific way.

[Sarah Druhan]

this was. FUCKED UP

[Desi Dee · Rating 4 out of 5]

these series are great. i highly recommend this book.