The Thief Lord

Robert Yoo

The Thief Lord

Fantasy

Cornelia Funke

 

The Thief Lord Summary

The story is set in Venice where abandoned houses and dark alleyways mix with great lagoons and tall buildings. In an abandoned movie theater called the Stella, a large place with a star-spangled curtain, a group of children live under the guidance of the Thief Lord. The Thief Lord is a boy named Scipio. He cares for the group of children by stealing things the children can sell. The two main characters of this story are also the newest recruits. Prosper is twelve and is the older brother of Bo, who is five. They are very close. So close that they ran away from their aunt Esther just to stay together, as their aunt had plans to separate them. Unlike most stories, their aunt is not evil. She just couldn’t care for both of the brothers so she wanted to send Prosper off to boarding school. The two brothers ran to Venice as their now-dead mother used to tell wonderful stories about the place. Now aunt Esther has hired a detective in Venice called Victor Getz to find Bo. Can Prosper and Bo avoid Victor and Esther? Read the book and see!

    After reading this book, I thought about how hard it must be to live on the streets. This book says it is much easier to manage living on the streets in a group rather than alone. It also made me think about how far you have to be pushed away by family and friends to run away from them. I could never manage that.

     I really enjoyed reading this book and I would recommend it for any and all ages. It has several good “ingredients” to be a really good story. By ingredients I mean things like orphaned brothers and a detective on their trail etc. I would rate this book as 9/10 for a well-written story with characters that have real depth. The storyline is also very well thought out.