Gideon the Cutpurse by Linda Buckley-Archer

World-Building Rating: Great

Characterization: Decent-Great

The cover of this novel had a strange magnetizing effect on me. It's a hardcover and the front of it has a hole through which an eye is looking back out at you. The rest of the cover fits really well with the historical nature of the novel, especially the spine. So yes, excellent cover. 

Moving past the cover, it's a great historical adventure story. It is written for a younger audience (the jacket says 10 and up) and that shows throughout the story, but I still found it enjoyable and couldn't put it down! I liked  the historical aspects the most both in the descriptions of 1763 England and all the little tidbits that give the novel itself a historical feel. It is organized like a Charles Dickens novel with chapter descriptions underneath the title and excerpts from Gideon's own account of his life. 

Details: Mild Spoilers Ahead

The characterizations were good, but I felt that the perspective characterizations could have been... deeper. I loved Gideon and the Tar Man and the other era characters, Peter was also well done because of the whole strained relationship with his father, but Kate just wasn't as well done as she could be. For some reason it felt as if the author maintained a little distance from her and we didn't get to see and feel her worries enough which made it annoying when she kept crying (which she did far too often). I also think that Kate could and should have done more with her knowledge of the area they were in - or at least she should have attempted to do more. I would have loved to see more of Gideon's perspective. 

The detective's sections could have been so much more than what they were. He was a very interesting perspective character at first, but it soon became clear that he wasn't going to get anywhere with his investigation and so I was slightly disappointed. There were other perspectives that could have enhanced the story like Kate's friend when she found the message and more of Peter's dad actually doing something and so on. 

It was the description of the historical setting that gave this book the Great world-building rating. The level of detail was just right and it painted a vivid image in my mind of some of the interesting highlights of what the children saw. It showed the challenges of living at the time and provided a good comparison from the children's perspective between 1763 and today. 

Which brings me to the point that I think this novel could have been written without Kate or Peter or the anti-gravity machine. It would be fascinating to read Gideon's and the Tar Man's stories from their own perspectives without the time-travel and all the modern stuff. I understand why the author did it, and it did work, but the history lover inside me would have devoured a the straight-history versions. 

Overall, it's a great book and I look forward to reading the next installment.