I started to obsess over somehow managing to buy Fever Crumb largely because of that totally cool cover of the US edition. They made Fever look badass, so I was a little disappointed when I started reading and found that she was not badass at all. She still was an interesting character though, especially in the beginning of the book.
There was a boy who strode about on stilts, and a man who was juggling with shining knives (“You must not try that at home, Fern,” Fever warned the little girl, remembering her role as the rational member of their party.) There was a man who was busy sawing a woman in half. (“Or that,” she added. “I expect it is all done with mirrors.”) A barker on the deck of a barge shouted at them through a big tin trumpet, inviting them to climb the boarding plank and see for themselves the lizard girl and the three-headed goat. “Mutations, no doubt,” said Fever, looking at the scary pictures painted on the barge’s stern. “It would be unkind to go and stare at them.” Ruan and Fern sighted a stall selling candyfloss, and their father bought three sticks. “It has no nutritional value whatsoever,” said Fever, looking doubtfully at the pink cloud he handed her.
That last bit just made me laugh, and I suddenly realised that Fever is my soulmate.
But the one truly awesome thing about this book were the paper boys. They weren’t around in Mortal Engines and it’s sequels so I suppose those few that were in this book were the last ones, and they won’t be making a comeback, at least not before Fever returns to London. Which is a shame, since in a way, when it comes to certain tasks, they are even more effective that Stalkers. The paper boys sneak around, which is suspenseful, while Stalkers just barge in (well, maybe except for the smarter ones), which I suppose is exciting in its own way, as long as the Stalkers are barging in on characters you care about, but it’s still not quite the same.
Now I have the book and have already read it, but back when that cover caught my interest, I thought I’ll never be able to buy it because it’s not sold around here (hardly any english books get sold around here) so I spent a few days just reading reviews, so I read quite a few spoilers, and I knew from what people wrote that the book felt like it ended too fast. I myself felt a little different thought. It didn’t end too fast, but the climax of the book wasn’t anywhere near as spectacular as in the books of the Mortal Engines Quartet. Whatever qualms I might have with Infernal Devices and A Darkling Plain, even those two ended in a breathtaking manner, while the ending of Fever Crumb was about as exciting as the beginning, which is not how it’s supposed to be.
And were wasn’t anywhere near enough death in the book. I love the cathartic feeling you get after reading through absolute devastation to get to the ending that is filled with hope for the future, and Fever Crumb had none of that.
I do intend to read A Web Of Air sooner or later because I’m curious about what Fever will do next and where she will stuff those two kids she took with herself, but my expectations are much lower, and I sort of regret that I didn’t buy the softcover edition of Fever Crumb because now I’ll have to keep buying hardcovers for consistency’s sake, and hardcovers from UK are ridiculously overpriced.
Anyway, 7.8/10.
[...] In my review of Fever Crumb I wrote that I didn’t like the ending all that much because it just wasn’t impressive enough. No cities exploding, no cities sinking, no general devastation. Nothing particularly spectacular happened in this book either, but it just seemed to flow much more naturally, and I didn’t find the ending to be underwhelming at all. The last few chapters were very exciting, very gripping, and definitely kept me on the edge of my (metaphorical) seat. The problem is in that this ending was not bittersweet (the sort that I like), it simply tore my heart to pieces. The cast did not die off, but it would have been better if it did, because then no one would have had to continue living and suffering. [...]