Book Bearings
Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children
Book 1 of Miss Peregrine
- 388 pages · about 6 hours
- First published 2011
- 13 editions
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1 About this book
As a child Jacob Portman loved his grandfather's stories about growing up in a home for children with strange abilities, watched over by a wise old bird, and about the monsters he had run from. As he grew older he stopped believing them. Then, when Jacob is sixteen, his grandfather meets a violent and mysterious death, leaving a few cryptic last words, and Jacob travels to a remote island off the coast of Wales. There he finds the ruins of the old house, and learns that the children in his grandfather's photographs may be more than a story. Ransom Riggs built his 2011 novel around real vintage photographs, which are reproduced throughout the book.
- Mystery
- Fantasy
- Horror
- Orphanages
- Graphic novels
- Supernatural
- Grandfathers
- Teenage boys
2 What to expect
A young adult fantasy built around eerie vintage photographs, which appear throughout the book: after his grandfather's strange death, a teenager travels to a Welsh island to learn whether the old man's tales of peculiar children were true. The first half is a slow, atmospheric mystery; the second becomes an adventure with monsters. It is the first book of a series and leaves the story unfinished.
Good for readers who want: a strange, atmospheric fantasy, vintage photographs, and the start of a gripping series.
3 About Ransom Riggs
Bio adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
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