Books by Walter Moers

When a book passes the 'So-So' to 'Good' mark in my books (pun intended... teehee), I usually try another book by the author. It's my way of assessing whether the author will rank it up there as one of my favourite authors, or will just drop to the reserve team - which I will only choose from when I run out of ideas.

Case in point - The City of Dreaming Books and The 13 1/2 lives of Captain Bluebear by Walter Moers.

Found in the science fiction section of Kino, Moers' books have always stood out for me amongst the wild eyed orcs and hooded mysterious heroes-adorned covers of other sci-fi books amongst the shelves. The cost was prohibitive however, over 30 bucks, but one time, during a 20% sale, I took the first plunge with The City of Dreaming Books.

The big fat book had illustrations interspersed throughout the story. By the author himself. I was sold. And I was subsequently bowled over by Moers creativity and imagination. He came up with a zany world called Zamonia, filled with colourful characters such as literary dinosaurs and a sinister shark grub (think shark head and worm-like body).

So top marks for Moers' critically acclaimed novels?
Not quite, at quite a few points along both stories, Moers went a little overboard with descriptions, which sometimes stretched for pages. Sure, the very original world and characters he created were great, but it did feel that he could be overindulgent at times. I ended up glazing over some sections of the text to move along with the story.

I guess Moers will have to settle for the reserve team, though he does feature quite high at the top.