Monday, June 18, 2012

Puppet Parade by Zeinab Alayan

The life of a puppet master is never ordinary. Oliver Deere knew this when he ran away from home to take up the trade of puppetry, but he had no idea just how much his life would change.
After his puppets come to life and flee town, Oliver meets up with a masked girl who hides a mysterious past. As they travel together in search for Oliver's lost puppets, they find that the line between puppet and master is becoming much less clear - and much more deadly. When Oliver and his companion enter the strange world of The Parade, they begin to realise that their journey will lead them to discover the truth behind a dangerous villain's path, and in the end, discover more about each other.


This was a fun and different story. There is a great sense of mood throughout the whole thing that really catches the reader’ attention, giving the novel a kind of flavor that makes it great to read. There’s a gothic darkness that I really enjoyed. Now, having said that, I did find some of the descriptions too long. They sometimes disrupted and slowed down the plot when it needed to stay crisp and fast-paced, maintaining some of the mood but not overwhelming us with details.

The characters are really varied and fun. The puppet creator and the girl who joins up with him make for great foils of each other, while the puppets are as creepy as you’d expect but also much more interesting than I would have imagined. There are many other characters which fill in the rest of the novel, each one with his or her own peculiarity, making for a great cast.

I was quite impressed with the novel’s conclusion, as all the loose ends were addressed in a careful manner. So, all in all, I do recommend this book for those of you who love a bit of gothic-ness and strangeness in your stories





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