THE ARCHITECT'S APPRENTICE.

THE ARCHITECT'S APPRENTICE (The Maps Of Time #1) by COLIN GARROW.

BACK COVER BLURB: London, 1630. Forced to work for the dubious Savidge, eleven-year-old Tom Fennel is desperate to find his father. Tom does not believe the stories he's been told and is convinced Savidge knows more than he is telling. Meanwhile, someone is stealing books from the private library of architect Martin Deacon. However, the thieves are only interested in books from the future ...

FIRST SENTENCE {Prologue ~ New Bond Street 2015}: The boy moves back into the shadow of the doorway.

MEMORABLE MOMENT {Page 150}: As Tom and Sarah arrive at her side, they too can she what she sees - the body covered in dirt lies in the bottom of the hole, but something is moving. A hand is reaching up, clawing at the dirt-encrusted sides of the tomb.

SOURCE: Received for review from the author.

MY THOUGHTS: What could be better than a book about books which lets face it surely must be every bibliophiles dream come true (I know its mine). How about a historical fiction in which you'll feel yourself in seventeenth century London? A seventeenth century London in which books, books from the future no less, are being stolen. 

Part historical fiction, part 'time slip' novel (different from a time travel novel I'm led to believe in that a time slip is more of an 'accidentally occurring' event as opposed to a more 'scientific' one in which some control is had). The latter by my own admission I'm easily confused by. However ...

Loving the thought that 'time breaks' are to be found in doorways all over London, time breaks that few people know are there. Though left a tad perplexed by some of the slips, of the possibility of changing the past/future, I certainly felt myself less dazed by The Architect's Apprentice than other books of the same genre - something largely due I'm sure by the fact that none of the characters actually 'met' themselves.

A wonderful way to introduce young readers to the period. Though the architect of the title, with his large library, has a comparatively 'glamorous' home there was nothing 'romantic' in the setting of the scene. The author doing a tremendous job of portraying London as a city of crowded streets, the cloying scent of the Thames tainting the very air, permeating the very bricks of the houses themselves. AND then of course there was the inclusion of some actual real life characters and events which I really enjoyed. 

Character wise ...

Main (child) protagonists, Tom, forced to work and occasionally steal by the unscrupulous Savidge, his sister, Sarah, a 'selective mute', worthy of a Dickensian novel. It was the adult characters that I somehow found less compelling despite the fact that I found them incredibly intriguing in that I was often left wondering just which of them was actually to be trusted.

A great start to what I feel is a highly promising series. If the preview from the next book, Mortlake, is anything to go by I think the books will go from strength to strength.