This is not your typical Disney Peter Pan retelling. Brom’s The Child Thief is gritty, dark, horrifying, fantastic, engrossing and full of more “real life” then should be present in any fairy tale.
This is the darker side of Peter. In the author’s notes at the end of the book, he makes note of some phrases he read in Barrie’s Peter Pan that made him begin to see the darker undertone of the story. At one point, Barrie speaks of Peter “thinning out” his Lost Boys.. when they get to be too many. When you hear someone speak of “thinning out” a group of people, just where does your mind go?
Aside from Peter, this book focuses on a young boy named Nick and his experiences with the Devils (the Lost Boys). There are gruesome battles, no pirates in this story, but a very suitable substitute. There are pixies and witches and elves. And did I mention that it’s dark?
Now, I will warn you. The language is foul in parts. When writing about some of the most obscene circumstances a child would want to run away from, it’s nearly impossible to refrain from placing words in those children’s mouths that a more fortunate child would not even know. So yes, the child being threatened by the drug dealer is going to drop some nasty language. This is not my justification for this, but understanding where these boys were coming from and what was involved in the story, it made it easier for me to glance over and and ignore the words, but still get the gist of the harshness of their lives.
And finally, the books theme is something interesting. We all think of Peter Pan and his friend Tinkerbell and say cute things like, wouldn’t it be wonderful to always be a child.. but I think maybe Brom understood more. Peter is a child who sought out other children who were unhappy. I mean, after all, Peter himself went out to play with fairies and came back to find his window locked against him and his place in his mother’s arms taken by another child. And what does Peter do when he finds these children? He convinces them to follow him, to fight his battles and to die for him.
This is not a story about the wonders and joys of being a child forever and ever. In fact, the only place that played a part in this story was when Brom brought to light just how horrifying that could be. This is a story of how easily it is to be caught in a trap of worship over the idea of someone, or an image they’ve projected, and find yourself dying because of how much you have devoted yourself to them. And at the end of the book, you may just find yourself asking along with Nick, was it worth it?
