Note: This post originally appeared on my discontinued website maartensity.com. The published date and time has been adjusted to match the original.
Isn't it strange? Sometimes you buy a book, it looks and is easy to read, promises to be entertaining--and yet rests on your shelf for ages. That was the case with The Invention of Hugo Cabret. I acquired the hardcover soon after it came out in 2007, yet only took it from the shelf last night--more out of a restless need to consume reading matter than a particularly focused interest.
And yet it was all finished in one sitting! The story boasts nearly 300 pages of illustrations, a further 120+ of prose, and is very innovative in its whole conception--you realise just how much towards the end, making it well worth the journey.
Its strength lies in the film-like sequences of illustrations to move the reader through the spaces that the characters occupy, adequately supported by passages of prose holding the story's panels together and expanding on the characters and the action. Nevertheless, the choice of subject is integral to the overall message and structural metaphysics of the novel, because the various facets of the book work together to provide its message, much like the different parts of the automaton in the story.
I should admit that I was seldom thrilled while reading it, merely pulled along by the speed of the ride. Yet as a whole it is a strangely compelling story with both educational and entertainment value.
Critics and reviewers (and this isn't a review as such) often judge too soon after reading a story, forgetting that its value is often changed by the way it grows on you (or fails to). I suspect The Invention of Hugo Cabret may have some aptitude in this regard, and I should give it the time it needs to prove itself.
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