REVIEW: City of Ember

This fall, you'll see posters and signs for City of Ember, aND IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN THE TRAILER YET YOU SHOULD SERIOUSLY CHECK IT OUT. IF FOR NOTHING ELSE, BILL MURRAY.

Crap. Caps lock. Sorry. Not re-typing it.

Anyhoo, I went out and bought the book. Also bought its two sequels (which sucks when you know that the story's going to be continued.)

The book is great. Really, nicely done. A simple story but it gets rolling toward a goal that is somewhat surprising, though you likely will figure it out if you're 16 years older than the intended readership age. Like me.

Anyhoo, The story is this: This mysterious city is all alone in the dark, dark world. No lights from the sky or anywhere else except the lamps powered throughout the city. By these lights the Emberians live, but recently the lights are flickering or staying off longer than normal. And everyone can sense an impending Doom, though two frends are the only ones who can do anything about it.

It's a familiar formula to the Harry Potter series, if you're just going by the above paragraph. But I had to write a LOT at work this week, so cut me some metaphorical slack. It's really not like Harry Potter at all.

So here's the thing about the book: It starts off as a great story, but in the last third of the book you can sense when the author finally gets an idea that she's not going to finish the book at all, but rather continue it into an Epic Saga. Do you remember the days when books and movies stood on their own? When sequels didn't have to be so much a part of the creative process? I kind of wish this story stood on its own, because if the quirky and quiet marketing campaign doesn't draw asses in the seats this movie might never get the sequel treatment it needs to stay true to the books.

Of course, it's Hollywood. It's not like they're coming up with anything else.