Book info

• Title Peter Pan
• Author J. M. Barrie
• Year 1911
• Genre Childrens

Soaring over a sleepy London and through twinkling stars, Peter Pan and Tinker Bell lead Wendy, Michael, and John Darling on a brilliant adventure to Neverland, where pirates, mermaids, and the Lost Boys play! With magic in the air, it all seems too good to be true until the Darling children meet Capitan Hook and his terrible crew and their tick tick ticking crocodile...

Thoughts

My knowledge of Peter Pan comes mostly from general things, like Captain Hook and the ticking crocodile, or else from the movie Hook, which is more of a sequel than an adaptation. I think I tried to read this a couple of times as a kid, but couldn’t get much past the first chapter.

Apropos of nothing, I thought I would give it another go, and whipped through it very quickly. What an enjoyable, if melancholy, read. I love the far-fetched imaginative nature of the whole thing. What is real and what isn’t? Are they eating real food or imagining it all? It had a really nice floaty feel to the whole thing.

But it’s got a darker edge than that, with the concerns about growing up, about leaving behind mother and father, about being locked in an endless circular battle on Neverland. Far more interesting than I thought it would be, not perfect, but very good. I only wish I’d persevered as a child!

Rating: 3 / 5