Cirrus Flux was a book full of action and drama...yet the ending was somewhat anti-climatic. ( )

This is a YA charmer. As such there is a shortness in the book hidden by the larger type and openness of paragraph kerning and spacing. A read that takes but a few short hours to consume.

There is treasure here, but it is hidden, and the telling of the story seems to be only opened like an onion with revealing flashback chapters that come at you in layers. For the younger person this reveal might indeed be just the thing, but for those of us older, we can see where there is a larger, greater amount of detail of the story we are not seeing.

That we would like to explore and learn of, instead of seeing this from the child like eyes of our hero, and his unknown heroine. There are parts of the period and people that are also hidden as the author has done his research but has left it out of the tale seeing that a young person may not want to learn of such. May not need the details that this would show.

In all, worthy of a read and a share if you have young people who you might want to share more of the era with and discuss with them. An introduction to speculative adventure fiction with an historical flair. ( )

So, I received this book through the Goodreads contest, mostly because the description looked interesting, and the title caught my eye. Sadly, what looked like a really fun read ended up as being a bit boring.

The story concerns two orphans at a hospital for foundling children- Cirrus Flux and a girl named Pandora. Cirrus, who had been dumped there by his explorer father, is trying to get on without his best friend, Bottle Top, and meets a mysterious gentleman who has been watching him from the grounds. Meanwhile, Pandora finds herself employed by Madame Orrery, a mesmerist who has an interest in finding Cirrus. Pandora knows she needs to help Cirrus get away, not to mention, find his father's token that may hold the key to why so many people are interested in Cirrus.

While the plot is good and I did like most of the characters, the book falls flat and seems really anticlimatic. Skelton never really explains his characters' motives or what his plot devices are used for. It seems like this is supposed to start a series, but the ending wraps up Cirrus's and Pandora's plotlines too neatly to continue. While the eighteenth-century London setting is engaging, it's hard to tell if this is supposed to be an outright fantasy (phoenixes and holograms are involved) or a historical adventure. The majority of the book is set up to discuss that the bad guys want Cirrus Flux and the sphere he owns, but there's never a reason given to why (outside of "I want power!") A plotline involving human dolls and electricity experiments only shows how different Cirrus and Bottle Top are and is promptly abandoned.

If there was a mention of a continuing story, I would recommend to read this, because it is interesting story. Unfortunately, it seems like a stand-alone book, so unless you really like historical kids' fiction, I would pass this up. ( )

In late eighteenth century London Cirrus Flux is pursued by a sinister woman mesmerist, a tiny man with an all-seeing eye, and a skull-collecting scoundrel, all of whom believe that he possesses an orb containing a divine power. Some connections with Pullman's idea of dust, but otherwise a much simpler story: the supernatural idea never really takes off. Still a good adventure story. Well-written.

A well written interesting book. Its a fairly simple plot that isn't super difficult to figure out the twists, but the world is really interesting and unique. The characters are also very interesting and different. Definitely worth reading. ( )