Book Review: The House With a Clock in Its Walls by John Bellairs 22
Summary
“When Lewis Barnavelt, an orphan. comes to stay with his uncle Jonathan, he expects to meet an ordinary person. But he is wrong. Uncle Jonathan and his next-door neighbor, Mrs. Zimmermann, are both witches! Lewis is thrilled. At first, watchng magic is enough. Then Lewis experiments with magic himself and unknowingly resurrects the former owner of the house: a woman named Serenna Izard. It seems that Serenna and her husband built a timepiece into the walls–a clock that could obliterate humankind. And only the Barnavelts can stop it!”
-From Amazon.com
Review
I actually only read this book because of the upcoming movie, which I am SOOOO excited about.
Of course, once I found out that it was a book, I had to get it. I will start off by saying that it is a younger YA novel, but that really didn’t bother me at all.
The book kept me page turning and so curious as to what would potentially be happening next. It was a very simple book to read, due to it being made for younger readers, but it wasn’t so simple that I felt like I was loosing brain cells as I was reading the book, which is always really nice.
As for the story, it was pretty straight forward. There was a boy in a house with some magical people and there was a clock, somewhere, and they had to find it. The people who used to live in the house were bad so there was that basic good versus evil idea going through the book. My complaint with the climax was it wasn’t very…climatic. I wouldn’t say it was anti-climatic because it resolved and it did go somewhere, but with adult novels they generally are a little bit more epic. I had to keep reminding myself that it was a book for younger kids so there couldn’t be the kind of violence and epicness that older YA novels, and adult novels, have in them. For the age it was meant for, it was good!
As for the main character Lewis Barnavelt, for me, he was a little bit obnoxious because he seemed like a real wimpy kid. I haven’t read the whole series of books with him so I know nothing about the series, but in this book I just wanted to shake him sometimes. He wanted to cry a lot and he felt like curling into a bawl quite a few times. I don’t generally mind a weak-ish character but just the timing of it and then his sudden bounce back was a little…meh. Of course, once again, it’s for younger readers so they won’t be noticing those kinds of things.
The novel, overall, was still an enjoyable read. It was also wonderful because it had illustrations. Not tons of them, but a few were dropped here and there, which brought the inner child in me out as I have’t had a book will illustrations in soooooo long! I was extremely happy!
In relation to the movie….
I’m definitely curious as to what the movie is going to do. Based off the trailer, it looks to be pretty big and epic, doesn’t it?
Just based off the trailer, I can already see so many differences between the book and the movie. The two adults should be older, the uncle should be a redhead, Lewis should be quite fat…the small things. There also seems to be some sort of creature or something in the movie?
I mean, I’m still going to see it as I don’t have an attachment to this book like with others….but I can already see that it has been Hollywood-ized.
That all aside, I still give the book 4/5 teacups! I don’t give it 5 because it’s a little bit below me and reading it, I see some flaws in the book, but for a child me, I’d have given it 5 teacups.
Still, 4 teacups means I thoroughly did enjoy it and do recommend checking it out. Especially if you’re going to be going to see the movie!
