Hello, reader!
It’s been a minute, but today I have a blog tour stop to share with y’all! I’m happy to be able to participate in another tour hosted by The Write Reads and I’m extra excited because this is for a new middle grade fantasy. The Pawnshop of Stolen Dreams by Victoria Williamson was a fun, quick read that I think younger readers would adore.
But, before I get to my review, I have people to thank. First, thank you to Dave @ The Write Reads and all of the crew for giving me a spot on this tour! Second, thank you to the author, the publisher, and Netgalley for providing me with a free e-ARC of the book so that I could participate in this tour. It is, as always, appreciated!
Now, let’s get the post!
In a strange little village called Witchetty Hollow, eleven-year-old Florizel is the first to run into the curious visitors who’ve come to open a brand new Daydream Delicatessen and sack-baby factory.
At first, it seems the daydream confection and cheap sack children are the best things that could have happened to the poor folk of the Hollow – after all, who has the money to rent their child from Storkhouse Services these days? But after a few weeks, Florizel starts to notice something odd happening to the adults of the town. First, they seem dreamy, then they lose all interest in their jobs and families. Soon they’re trading all their worldly goods in the newly-opened Pawnshop for money to buy daydreams. With no money for rent payments, the children of Witchetty Hollow are being reclaimed by Storkhouse Services at an alarming rate. Florizel needs to act.
A magical tale of intrigue and adventure from award-winning children’s author Victoria Williamson
Author Links
Victoria Williamson grew up in Glasgow, Scotland, and has worked as an educator in a number of different countries, including as an English teacher in China, a secondary science teacher in Cameroon, and a teacher trainer in Malawi.
As well as degrees in Physics and Mandarin Chinese, she has completed a Masters degree in Special Needs in Education. In the UK she works as a primary school special needs teacher, working with children with a range of additional support needs including Autistic Spectrum Disorder, Down Syndrome, physical disabilities and behavioural problems.
She is currently working as a full time writer of Middle Grade and YA contemporary fiction, science fiction and fantasy, with a focus on creating diverse characters reflecting the many cultural backgrounds and special needs of the children she has worked with, and building inclusive worlds where all children can see a reflection of themselves in heroic roles.
Victoria’s experiences teaching young children in a school with many families seeking asylum inspired her debut novel, The Fox Girl and the White Gazelle, an uplifting tale of redemption and unlikely friendship between Glaswegian bully Caylin and Syrian refugee Reema.
Twenty percent of her author royalties for The Fox Girl and the White Gazelle are donated to the Scottish Refugee Council.
Thank you to The Write Reads and the publisher for providing me with a free e-book in exchange for an honest review! All opinions contained within are my own.
Fantasy being one of my favorite genres is nothing new. Recently, though, I’ve been exploring middle grade fantasy more and more. There are just so many incredible stories out there and I love finding them! There’s also the fact that my son is firmly in the middle grade reading zone and I like to pass books on to him that I think he’ll enjoy. So when I saw the tour for The Pawnshop of Stolen Dreams advertised, I immediately jumped on board!
This novel follows a young girl named Florizel who lives in the town of Witchetty Hollow. Florizel, like all the other children in her town, has been rented by her gammer as people can no longer have children because of pollution from sack baby factories. To keep her rent low, Florizel must pretend to be less than she is, which makes her a target for bullying at school. Then, she makes the most unlikely of friends… a sack boy that has escaped from the factories in search of a true family.
This was such a fast, engaging read! I enjoyed the characters the most, with Florizel charming me instantly. Burble, our sack boy friend, is a bundle of disaster and I love that about him, haha. These two main characters get the most love in this story because the others didn’t feel as well-developed as them. They were a bit like caricatures of vices the author wished to portray. Still, I think for the younger end of middle grade, that’s not a bad thing at all! It makes the messages of the story pretty clear.
The story itself was a wonderful mixture of eeriness and heart that I truly enjoyed. The only issue I had is that it all felt so rushed! It is a shorter book, coming in at just over 200 pages, but there’s so much going on in the plot that I think this could have benefitted from being a bit longer. I wanted to know so much more about this world and the villains! Still, what we did get was definitely compelling and had me flying through the pages.
Overall, I think this was a solid middle grade fantasy, especially for kids on the lower end of the age range. It had great characters, the writing sucks you in, and the story was just fun. In that spooky sort of way.
Star rating:
Kerri McBookNerd 