A
while ago I was struck by a thought: I read the Artemis Fowl
books compulsively when they were first published, yet today I can
barely recall anything from them. I remember reading them while being
dragged around on holiday by my parents. When I was around 11 I was
on something of an Eoin Colfer kick and devoured just about
everything of his I can lay my hands on: the Benny books, The Wish
List, The Supernaturalist and the Artemis Fowl
series.
I read
his books because at the time, Colfer was one of those authors who
seemed to be everywhere. I felt something of an obligation to read
his work, even though I admit I can't remember enjoying much of
anything he wrote (hence my failure to remember anything from them).
Now in late adulthood, I thought it was time for a reappraisal of
Colfer, and have begun with the first in his “cyber-fantasy”
series, Artemis Fowl.
The
simple-yet-absurd plot runs like this: a 12-year-old aspiring
supervillain plans to kidnap a fairy so he can extort a fortune in
gold from its comrades, which he means to use to rebuild his family's
criminal empire. To Artemis Fowl's ill-fortune, the fairy he captures
is Captain Holly Short, an officer of an elite police squad, which
prompts the rest of her division to respond with extreme prejudice.
Artemis
Fowl works largely because of its balance in tone. As said above,
our protagonist's masterplan sounds like the sort of absurd scheme a
child would come up with (though I'm sure plenty of adults have
concocted far worse), yet is carried through with unwavering
efficiency by Artemis and his allies. Artemis himself is something of
a Stewie Griffin-type. He has the brains and audacity to potentially
be a master criminal, but is tempered by a childlike sensibility. For
instance, his scheme kicks off when he puts out an online
advertisement which effectively says: Irish billionaire will pay
lots of money to meet a fairy.
This is the type of joke I only got as an adult – Colfer I've found
is really good at this sort of adults-only stuff – but for Artemis
it never crosses his mind that such an ad could be misinterpreted.
Artemis is also given some depth in his interactions with his
henchman, Butler, and his demented mother. It's unsurprising that
Artemis's only real friend would be his bodyguard, which gives the
concept (a small boy giving orders to an immense, trained killer) a
touch of poignancy. His relationship with his mother is even worse.
YA books often have one or both parents missing, most often dead. In
this case, Artemis' father has vanished and his mother is deeply
traumatised by it, even haranguing her own son when she doesn't
recognise who he is. It's a nasty bite to give to what is otherwise a
punchy action-comedy. Thankfully Colfer doesn't wallow in it enough
to make it melodramatic, but gives it enough attention to make
Artemis more depth.
Of course, the fairy side of things is where Colfer really starts to
go crazy with the concept. Our focus here is the Recon division of
the Lower Elements Police – ie, LEP Recon. They live underground
and travel in magma-driven capsules. The elves try to keep peace
between warring goblins and dwarves. Occasionally they're forced
above ground to deal with any escapees that may blow their cover, in
one case a marauding troll.
Holly Short and Commander Julius Root give our insights into this
world and how it functions. These are both likeable, engaging
characters, though a bit too cliché. Holly is the young rookie eager
to prove herself (first female Recon officer as well, in case it
wasn't obvious enough), while Root is the short-tempered,
cigar-chomping boss who always gives his team a hard time (but has a
heart beneath it all). Nothing particularly wrong with any of this,
but it's something we've all seen before in some variation.
One
character who I remember enjoying even as a child (and still did this
time) was Mulch Diggums, the kleptomanic dwarf who's roped into
burglarising Fowl Manor. Mulch is the one character whose motives are
not directly connected to anyone else's. He doesn't seem to care
about stopping a war or about helping Artemis' plan. He only wants
his freedom and helps anyone he can as long as it gets him that. He's
like a far, far less annoying Jack Sparrow. His interactions with
Root and Foaly are really funny (again, it's the sort of disgruntled
dynamic adults would easier relate to) and his brief encounters with
Butler are a highlight of the book. I only wish we'd had more of a
confrontation between Mulch and Butler, though Colfer promises more
in later books.
With Mulch we also come to the part that might divide people over the
books and their appeal to adults, namely the scat humour. While a
dwarf explosively defecating on someone's head sounds like something
you'd find in a Seltzerberg movie (I'm sure it exists but I don't
hate myself enough to check), I think Colfer saves it with his dry
tone. As I said before, the book's balancing of ridiculousness and
seriousness is one of its strongest points. The clipped narrative (by
a fairy psychologist) makes a nice contrast with the crudity of the
subject matter. I was anxious that Mulch's combustible bowels would
turn me off the rest of the story, but it wasn't half as cringeworthy
as I thought it would be.
I also found Holly's and Artemis' interactions all-too-brief, but
fascinating all the same. The mutual disdain-cum-fascination teases a
lot for their future encounters. Holly granting Artemis his wish at
the end adds a further wrinkle, and I look forward to rediscovering
how that develops.
Indeed,
I look forward to seeing how all of this develops. Artemis
Fowl proves a fun ride after
all. I only wonder what I was missing out on as a youngster.
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