Lawrence Leonard (1923–2001)

This is a cute book - nothing spectacular, very typical of books of this type from the 80's. We have a brother sister duo, who manage to get themselves in danger - with one of the pair trying to save the other.

What makes this book stand out is where its set - in a secret world beneath London, with two groups of people, the Railwaymen and the Canal Folk, who are at war with each other. When the two kids wander down into this world, they inadvertently start a war, and with both groups of underground men after the kids, the kids need to run for their life.

Like it said earlier, its fairly typical for books of this type. It really should be much darker than it was. If this secret society doesn't want to be discovered, the only thing to do is to kill all outsiders, but its a children's book - and nobody gets seriously hurt.

Another thing - there is only one main female character - Jen, the sister (who needs her younger brother to save her). The underground folk have no women with them. Its a strange society - and it doesn't make much sense if you think about it to hard. There is reference to farming and two where the women of this society live, but there is no other explanation.

The world of canals and train tracks are fun, and I liked the race to Beasley's Arches. The author wrote an action packed ride with steam boats and trains, with just the right amount of scariness for a book of this type.

As for the ending- it was disappointing. It just sort of ended, no real character building, everything goes back to the way it was. The appendixes at the end of the book help a little with this ending - I suspect they were tacked on to give the ending a bit more closure.

I can see this book made into a really cool movie - maybe a Miyazaki? But as a book to read, I found it cute, but a bit flat. This is a 3.25 star book, which I rounded up to 3.5.… (mere)