The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy ★★☆☆☆ #BookReview #BookBlog

~ KayCKay

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Primary Genre(s): Gift book?, Graphic Novel?
Published: 10 Oct 2019 by Ebury Press
Page count: 128
My Format: ebook via Overdrive
Cover: Attractive
Pacing: No pace
Ending: No ending
Would I recommend it: No
Commission Link: Buy The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse

My rating: ★★☆☆☆ 

Synopsis from Goodreads
Enter the world of Charlie’s four unlikely friends, discover their story and their most important life lessons.

My Thoughts
Huh? I’m not sure what I just read. Here are my pros and cons for The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse:

Pros

  1. Illustrations are cute, although a bit rough around the edges… literally.
  2. The mole and the cake references were cute.

Cons

  1. Cursive is sometimes difficult to read.
  2. There is no story – this is a gift book at best.
  3. This is just a collections of platitudes that we’ve all heard or read before. There is literally nothing new to see here.

Summary
I saw another reviewer note that this book was basically “Instagram wisdom” and that is exactly what this is. [Credit to the person who said that first – I wish I had noted who it was.] This is just a collection of feel-good statements bound up in a book. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think reinforcing kindness, for example, is a bad thing… but this book was over-the-top saccharin for me. It is like the corniest Hallmark card you can think of, but 128 pages worth!

Besides the platitudes, there was no story. The only real connective tissue in the book was the mole talking about cake from time to time. I was expecting a story of some kind and instead I got a bunch of clichés… so I was really disappointed. I’m glad I didn’t spend money on this.

Again, I appear to be in the minority here. I’m glad others liked it, but I really didn’t.

If you would like to read this book and form your own opinion, please consider purchasing through this link: Buy The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases at no extra cost to you. Thanks!

Click here for a description of my rating scale.

(image from Goodreads)

Published by KayCKay

Just a girl, with a book, sharing her thoughts.

6 thoughts on “The Boy, the Mole, the Fox and the Horse by Charlie Mackesy ★★☆☆☆ #BookReview #BookBlog”

  5. Kay, thank you for your review, I thought I was alone in thinking this was just an empty collection of platitudes. The book was recommended to my 10-year old by a librarian and you know how children are – they see a cute animal and all’s good. Luckily, to her, cliches don’t yet exist and every idea is fresh and new. To me, I just could not stand reading it without groaning aloud.

    The book reminded me (and I’m afraid this will make me enemies) of Little Prince. I could not understand that either and its emptiness felt aggravating.

    The Boy and the Mole feels like something written by a person on mushrooms, who thinks every trite idea is so grand and life-saving for humanity that it needs to be put into book format (bound, no less).

    The translation into Slovak was also weak, but that’s no fault of the author.

    Liked by 1 person

  6. You are honestly the only other person I’ve come across who agrees with me about this book. To my dying day I will never understand the praise it has gotten. By the way… “written by a person on mushrooms, who thinks every trite idea is so grand and life-saving for humanity that it needs to be put into book format (bound, no less)” is brilliant and true! Hilarious!

    Like

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