On Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony and Half-Moon Investigations by Eoin Colfer

Wow. What a way to end the series (I don't know if Eoin Colfer plans to write any more Artemis Fowl but if he doesn't end up adding any more to the series than The Lost Colony was an excellent way to finish up the story).

Personally I have always been interested in time travel and the whole idea of messing with the time/space continuum which is what this book does when it introduces an 8th family to the people, demons. Granted, involving demons usually sends a book in a whole different direction of myth and lore but Colfer managed to keep these demons from dragging the book away from the original tone of the stories.

I feel as though I jumped too quickly on the de-villainizing of Artemis Fowl's character. Now that I have read all five books currently in the series I understand why these stories can take the direction they take and why Artemis gradually becomes not so much the always bad criminal mastermind. If Artemis didn't change at all his character would be as static and stock as any other super-villain pulled out of the hat. Colfer though throws some twists in there that make me very sad that there are no more books in the series.

Half-Moon Investigations

Now, this book is not currently part of a series but the way the book ends leaves the door open for many more to come just as Artemis Fowl did.

I have to say though that I didn't like this book as much. I liked Artemis Fowl a lot because of how Colfer wove together humans (or Mud Men :D) and the People (fairies). The extreme danger that Holly and Artemis usually find themselves in culminated usually from the conflict between the aforementioned groups.

In Half-Moon Investigations I simply see Fletcher Moon as another reincarnation of a typical pre-teen kid turned detective. I could list all of the various incarnations but there's really no point in that.

Granted, the story had all of the plot twists and turns that I have come to expect from a Colfer book but I simply wasn't as drawn into the story. Perhaps Colfer should stick with little boy criminal masterminds starting to turn good because Fletcher, as a goodie two shoes from the beginning just wasn't as convincing.

In conclusion, I strongly recommend the Artemis Fowl books and if one still wants more written by the same author than I would advise him to pick up Half-Moon Investigations. For Colfer's sake I'm glad that Half-Moon Investigations was not his first book. Publishers might not have given him enough rope to string out Artemis Fowl.