Pierre Bottero (1964–2009)

Update: A friend pointed out that this book has not been translated into English in full and only a comics came out instead. I find this is quite unfortunate for girls reading in English...

Original review
Sometimes I read books recommended to my daughter by her teacher. It is nice to be able to discuss a book together with my 12-year old. As her world inevitably moves further away from mine with time, this is yet one of the activities we can share. On top of that I get a chance to read show more something in easy French, the language I still hope to master one day.

This book was a delightful experience for both of us. My daughter read it in Paris cafes and restaurants, comparing the Paris of pre-COVID days with the descriptions of the city she found in the book. She had a long chat with a waitress once, who shared her own impressions of reading the same book ten years prior and encouraged my daughter to continue with the entire series. I grabbed the book on our return home and stormed through it in a couple of days - my fastest read in French to date!

I won't describe the book in detail. The parallel world is well conceived and carefully crafted. It's a place you want to revisit, so I guess I will be coming back to check out what happens later. The main character - a girl with a strong personality and budding magical powers - is able to stand her ground against preconceptions of adults of both worlds. She is the main force driving this book to its eventual success. Fabulous imagination of the writer, unexpected shifts and changes in the story line and transitions from one world into another help make the book enjoyable from the beginning to the end. Add to this the important questions of race and gender discrimination, lack of parental attention and understanding faced by children in different social strata, and above all the strength of true friendship and you get the full picture. Give this book to your child, especially if you have a daughter aged between eight and thirteen!

Invariably, adult characters are somewhat shallow, they are simply sketches of bigger humans surrounding the children in the book. However, this is not really a complaint. It might be that this is pretty close to how children perceive us in reality. From a perspective of a child - it's full five stars! show less

This is one of the best trilogy I've ever read. The way Pierre writes just literally pulls you in the world that the characters evolve in, you get 100% attached to the characters and when you are a teenager like me can relate to them as if they were you or your friends. There is just a bit more fantasy that in your own life. It is impossible to put those books down. They are sleep stealer, I've spend nights reading those books without being able to stop. But sadly, I think they were not show more translated in English yet. I hope they will soon because Pierre's writing should be known by the world, even the universe. This review can apply to "Les mondes d'Ewilan" and "Ellana" or even "Les ames croisees" because they are all written the same way, with the same exact dosage humour, suspense, drama, poetry and everything else that makes a good book. show less

This is the last book that Pierre wrote before his unexpected death. Rumors says that it might have been finished by somebody else. I doubt of that because this last book has this same writing style than all of the other ones. It is sadly the first one of a trilogy that should never be finished but still leave the fans with a open door to image the end that this completely new story should have. I think it is one of the most beautiful book Pierre wrote and it is the one of the few books he show more wrote that isn't in the Ewilan serie. I strongly recommend it for people that have lots of imagination and that like to invent or make up the end of a story that will probably never be written and of course for people who already read some or all of Pierre's books and liked them. (I think this book is not translated in English yet but hope it will soon) show less

Ellana est face à son destin, et doit livrer une ultime bataille pour tenter de retrouver ce qu'elle a de plus précieux au monde: son fils, enlevé par les mercenaires du Chaos. Mais où se trouve la cité des mercenaires? Est-il encore temps de sauver Destan et l'Empire, promis tous deux à un terrible avenir?

Le Pacte des Marchombres invite le lecteur à pénétrer dans les arcanes d'une guilde aux pouvoirs extraordinaires, et à suivre par sa psychologie, ses exploits physiques et son show more insatiable goût de la liberté. show less