On paper, a great premise - a man can read characters into books when he reads them aloud, although the downside is that someone has to go back in to replace them. When the story starts, 12 year old Meggie is living a peripatetic life with her father, Mo, who earns a living as a bookbinder. She has inherited his love of books and doesn't miss her mother who "went away" 9 years ago. Later on, she learns that her mother disappeared into a novel read aloud by Mo, at the same time that a number of villains came out, including Capricorn, the ink hearted villain of the title.

When the story opens, a strange man called Dustfinger who is also from the book, turns up to warn them that Capricorn is on their trail again - this is why they have moved around such a lot. Mo has been keeping everything secret from Meggie but now she gradually finds out about her father's gift and her mother's fate. Capricorn wants Mo to be permanently on call to read riches or anything else he wants out of books. When Mo, Meggie and Dustfinger escape to the house of Elinor, Meggie's mother's aunt, they only succeed in dragging her into danger as well.

I have a few problems with the book. Firstly, it is far too long, with a story stretched to unfeasible lengths. Until the last few chapters, not a great deal happens other than various characters stumble round getting caught, escaping and getting caught again. After their first breakout from Capricorn's sinister village, Elinor goes home alone, even though the villains have already carried out one home invasion, while Mo and Meggie stay in the area for a number of days because the book's author lives there.

Secondly, as well as acting foolishly, the characters aren't that well characterised and the villain is totally colourless with his henchman Basta outshining him. Mo comes across as selfish and absorbed in his desire to somehow read his wife out of the book in the first half of the story - only in the second does he appear to develop a care for his daughter. Quite a few others are self absorbed besides Mo (who we find late on is actually Mortimer), such as Dustfinger who wants to dump Farid, the boy from 1001 Nights who is probably the best character in the book, Elinor with her absorption in books and the book's author who delights in meeting his creations and doesn't take the situation seriously for a long time, considering that Capricorn's men have been terrorising his grandchildren. Also I admit to being put off Meggie when she reveals, early on, that she dislikes Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

There are also some clunky areas - for example, although I suppose when Elinor is introduced there is the subtle clue of her having a short neck, I was brought up abruptly when the villains suddenly started calling her "the fat woman" having gone through many chapters picturing her as a tall trim woman. Maybe it is a defect in translation, but it jarred and possibly translation issues are responsible for some of the other problems in this book.

The basic idea is great, but if only the book being read from by Mo had been a great classic or two - what great fun could have been had with those characters brought into the real world - but unfortunately, Inkheart, the book within a book, despite its cast of thousands of fairies, trolls, giants et al, appears to be an extremely dull book judging by the humourless gang of goons making up Capricorn and his band of unmerry men. The resulting tale is a cross between a fantasy and a melodramatic story about the Mafia, so I am not at all tempted to read the sequels. ( )

It got too wordy in places, but otherwise, it was a great book. ( )

Ik geef het boek 4 sterren. Eigenlijk ietsje minder als ik naar mezelf kijk, maar ik behoor niet tot de doelgroep en ik vind het voor de doelgroep zelfs een dikke 4 sterren. Goed plot, vlot geschreven en goede karakters. Wat wil je nog meer? ( )

How did the mom get read out of the book if she isn't mentioned in it? ( )

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