Cannonball Read 13

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time

Search This Site

| Log in
  1. Follow us on Facebook
  2. Follow us on Twitter
  3. Follow us on Instagram
  4. Follow us on Goodreads
  5. RSS Feeds

  • Home
  • About
    • About CBR
    • Getting Started
    • Cannon Book Club
    • Diversions
    • Fan Mail
    • Holiday Book Exchange
    • Book Bingo Reading Challenge
    • Participation Badges
    • AlabamaPink
  • Our Team
    • Leaderboard
    • The CBR Team
    • Recent Comments
    • CBR Interviews
    • Our Volunteers
    • Meet MsWas
  • Categories
    • Review Genres
    • Tags
  • Fight Cancer
    • How We Fight Cancer
    • How You Can Donate
    • Book Sale
    • CBR Merchandise
    • Supporters and Friends of CBR
  • FAQ
  • Contact
    • Contact Form
    • Newsletter Sign Up
    • Newsletter Archive
    • Follow Us
> FAQ Home
> Genre: Fantasy > Please read me into this book

Please read me into this book

Inkheart by Cornelia Funke

January 31, 2021 by Jenna 6 Comments

Twelve-year-old Meggie’s dad Mo is a book doctor. She supposes the rest of the world calls him a “bookbinder,” but to her he’s a book doctor. He takes well-loved, well-worn, well-wrecked books and carefully restores them to even better than before. He’s got a magic touch, and every bookseller in Europe knows it. Meggie has spent her life traveling with him from bookshop to bookshop, repairing books. So she knows that he doesn’t just travel all over for the sake of it. There’s something he’s looking for, but he won’t tell her what.

And then a man named Dustfinger shows up at their door and tells Mo Capricorn is on his trail again. Nothing about this makes sense to Meggie, and it makes even less sense when they travel to Italy to stay with her Aunt Elinor and her massive library. Things continue to make very little sense when Mo is kidnapped, along with a strange book he brought. Meggie supposes she’ll just have to chase after him and make him explain everything. Too bad his explanation of “I read Dustfinger and Capricorn out of a book filled with fairies and trolls and magic into the real world” doesn’t make too much sense either.


I have spent a month searching for this series. I read it when I was a kid and it was absolutely foundational — I’m talking I read and re-read the second book probably twenty times over a few years. I love Cornelia Funke, I love her worlds, I love her writing, I love everything she’s ever put out (except Ignatius, I never got into that guy). I have been operating under the assumption that we all had this experience and held her work in the same breath as Harry Potter, or His Dark Materials, or the Chronicles of Narnia.

Imagine my surprise when I visited four different bookstores in a ~1.5 hour radius and couldn’t find any of her work! I ended up going to Wonder Books in Frederick, MD to sell some boxes of books and CDs my family had lying around and spent all $35 in store credit I got on Funke’s Inkworld series, Dragon Rider, and Thief Lord. I look forward to rereading everything.

Now, back to Inkheart. It holds up! It’s incredible! It still holds that magic for me. I love Dustfinger so much, that poor sweet coward. I love the world. I love the terror lurking under every plot point. I love Elinor. I love Meggie and Mo. I’m so excited to get into Inkspell and into Dustfinger’s homeworld.

Filed Under: Fantasy, Fiction, Young Adult Tagged With: Cornelia Funke

Jenna's CBR13 Review No:8 · Genres: Fantasy, Fiction, Young Adult · Tags: Cornelia Funke ·
Rating:
· 6 Comments

About Jenna

CBR13 participant

I'm an engineering student who reads books to think about literally anything other than engineering. My favorite genre is “takes place in an old hotel.” View Jenna's reviews»

Comments

  1. andtheIToldYouSos says

    January 31, 2021 at 3:21 pm

    hooray! I’m happy you found it again, and I’m happy it held up!

    Reply
  2. wicherwill says

    February 1, 2021 at 2:33 am

    I never read these books as a kid! My brother has all of them on his childhood bookshelf, though, and that’s a close drive away…

    They held up, would you think they would…uh…build up(?) for someone who didn’t read them as a kid? For context I re-read HP vicariously until people started pointing out all the noxious stuff in the books itself (nevermind the Head Poobah herself eventually imploding) and re-read things like Tamora Pierce and Patricia Wrede that I read as a kid still. But I tried reading Percy Jackson as an adult for the first time and found it impossible to finish.

    Reply
  3. Singsonggirl says

    February 1, 2021 at 4:55 am

    Oh Cornelia Funke was such an essential part of my childhood too! Can’t wait ’til you get to the The Thief Lord, it’s my favourite of her books and I can still conjure up that world she transported me to, it’s hauntingly beautiful.

    Reply
  4. narfna says

    February 1, 2021 at 3:46 pm

    These books came out when I was in college, so I wasn’t a kid, but I definitely loved them! I’ve also read The Thief Lord and Dragon Rider. She’s got a bunch of other books and I never got around to them. I think she’s actually working on a follow up #4 to this series, and I am totally here for that!

    Also, pre-pandemic, my city hosted this huge book festival and she came one year, and she’s just the kookiest lady. It was so fun meeting her, and I think I got her to sign my copy of the first book in this series.

    Reply
    • BlackRaven says

      February 1, 2021 at 4:21 pm

      That’s awesome! It’s always nice to know that an author is nice. I’ve meet several and I lost all my love for a local author/illustrator because she was a bit snooty.

      Reply
  5. BlackRaven says

    February 1, 2021 at 4:20 pm

    Just don’t watch the movie if you love the books.

    Reply

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.



Recent Comments

  • Emmalita on An Interesting Woman in a Sharp SuitI think this is a series you will both like.
  • narfna on An Interesting Woman in a Sharp SuitI'm so excited to get to this series later this year. I can't wait to see what he can do with a full novel (#3)....
  • LanierHgts on I hated this book and I could not stop reading itGood to know it’s not just me! But liking or hating a book is subjective. And I am too old to care what others think...
  • andtheIToldYouSos on An Interesting Woman in a Sharp Suitthat artwork is lovely!
  • murderofcrows on We’re the aliens, manThis series- and I'll go with series too- definitely gave me so much to think about! Doors of Eden is on my TBR list. I've...
See More Recent Comments »

Want to Help Out?

CBR has a great crew of volunteers, and we're always looking for more people to help out. If you have a specialty or are willing to learn, drop MsWas a line.

  • How You Can Donate
  • FAQ
  • Shop
  • Volunteers
  • Leaderboard
  • AlabamaPink
  • Contact

Help Our Mission

You can donate to CBR via:

  1. PayPal
  2. Venmo
  3. Google Pay
© 2021 Cannonball Read | Log in