Make Way for The Anti-Harry

Artemis Fowl, hero of a new book of the same name, isn't anything like Harry Potter. He's sneaky, deceitful, and considers himself a criminal mastermind. But Talk Miramax Books and Hyperion, his American publishers, hope he'll attract the same audience that J. K. Rowling's hero has drawn when Artemis Fowl is published this month. Fowl author Eoin Colfer, an Irish schoolteacher, has six previous children's books, including Benny and Omar (O'Brien, 1998), to his credit. The publishers reportedly offered Colfer one of the largest advances in children's book history (nearly $1.3 million for the combined book and movie rights). But critics may not be as generous. SLJ's reviewer (p. 148) calls the character of Artemis "too stiff and enigmatic to be interesting."