Oracles of Delphi Keep by Victoria Laurie
Book Review and Summary of This Young Adult Adventure Novel
Jul 3, 2009
The Oracles of Delphi Keep moves from one extreme to the other; the climax and other action scenes add a wonderful intensity to the story, but the down time is a little too slow and might make young readers bored.
Summary
One stormy night, a stranger arrives on the doorstep of Delphi Keep—a quaint English orphanage. He delivers baby girl, and with her, a crystal necklace. The two ladies who run the orphanage give five-year-old Ian, who watched as the girl arrived, the responsibility of naming and looking after her as if she were his own sister. He names her Theodora—Theo for short—and the two of them become inseparable.
Eight years later, Ian is one of the oldest boys in the orphanage. He’s a curious boy who enjoys exploring the nearby caves—an activity strictly forbidden after one of the caves collapsed. On one of his caving expeditions, he and Theo discover an old box half-buried in the Earth. He struggles to extract it while the sound of an angry creature approaches from the end of the cave. They escape with seconds to spare. But their relief is short-lived when the creature—a hideous, massive beast—tracks them to the orphanage.
The beast is relentless. It tears up the orphanage, smashing everything in its path in its pursuit of Ian. But once he faces the beast head on, it turns its attention instead to Theo. What could the beast possibly want with Theo when Ian was the one you stole the box?
Ian and Theo later learn of an oracle and its connection to Theo’s gift of sight. The box they found was more than mere treasure. It was a long-lost artifact from the time of the Ancient Greeks. Now the past is colliding with the present in mysterious and haunting ways. Following an ancient prophecy, Ian, Theo, and four others embark on a journey that tests their strength, endurance and bravery at every turn.
Review
Set just before World War II, The Oracles of Delphi Keep starts off strong. The first chapter captures you with its intensity and clear description. But the middle drags on with lots of explaining and very little action. This book is targeted at a young-adult readership, about ages 9 to 13. But their attention spans are short, and for such a long book—549 pages—they may give up a third of the way through.
It would be a shame, however, because the final third of the book is buzzing with intense action as the kids travel to Morocco, landing on one life-threatening situation after another. If the young readers can push through the middle, they’ll be rewarded with a satisfying conclusion.
The characters have strong, vivid personalities, allowing readers to build a connection. They have all the qualities that make a good child protagonist—determined, resourceful, and a little careless at times. They were more polite than you’d expect of orphans that age, but that could be a result of the time and place in which the book is set.
Oracles of Delphi Keep by Victoria Laurie | Delacorte Press, 2009 | ISBN 9780385735728
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