Read this to my 7 y.o. boy. He absolutely loved it. I couldn't wait for bedtime so that we could read a few chapters.

I liked this installment even less than the first one and I am not even going to bother with the third, Secret of Rundoon. My little sister read it and informed me that it didn't end very happily, which I had seen coming for quite a while. Again, I think that they would have done better to have told the story more originally than within the framework of the accepted official version, or, better, to have left it at Peter and the Starcatchers.

Just like the previous book, Peter and The Shadow-thieves was just a another made up backstory of Peter Pan. However... this book strayed away from the original Peter Pan story we all know and love, therefore it was more interesting to read!

I loved this book! It kept me reading the whole time-I couldn’t put the book down. Also, the characters were great. Sometimes sequels are not as good as the first one, but in this case Peter and The Shadowtheives was just as good. It was filled with action and adeventure that made me feel like I was in the book. Everything was so well described, I had a picture in my head of what things would look like. There were also just some magical moments where you thought: Oh, that’s from Peter Pan.
tPeter is living in Mollusk Island now with a group called The Lost Boys. Then Peter travels to London to find Molly Aster. Together they go to find the starstuff, the biggest amount there’s ever been. Starstuff is a celestial body with immense power, and there’s a group of people called The Others who want to use it for bad. The Starcatchers, however, use it for good. And then there’s Lord Ombra. The thing that’s not a person. It’s something. Something dangerous and deadly.

Peter and the starcatchers have a second book Peter and the shadow theives. An unexpected visitor arrives at the island with a few of the "others." They came for the stardust, but one of the "others" are absolutly not normal. He wears a cape and through the hood all you can see are two red orbs, and did i menchin when you are near him you are shivering cold. and when he touches your shadow he takes over you! He will know everything you know! After taking the mulusk cheifs shadow they diside to go to a passific house in London. The Aster's. wh
Afer a moments hesitation he says a small farewell to his buddy's and him and tink are now going to stowaways on their ship.
They arrive to London, but can the stop the "others" with their advantage of the caped figure who calls himself Lord Ombra. Will they get the starstuff? Can he save the Asters?
(Awesome)

An excellent sequel to an excellent book, it is a simple adventure book that keeps you interested the whole way through. I stand by what I mean when I say this series is better than the original Peter Pan.

My 11 year old loves this series! He's so happy there are more to read!

Peter and the Starcatchers was a delightfully clever prequel to the Peter Pan story that didn't fill in every gap between its events and Barrie's novel but also had a clear enough resolution that it wasn’t begging for a sequel. But sequel it Dave Barry and Ridley Pearson did (alas, the sequelling only worked a couple of times), and the result is a story that fits comfortably within the new Starcatchers universe that was established in the previous book but feels relatively detached from the Peter Pan mythos in general.

Just to be clear, that isn’t a problem—but it is something to note. People who are looking for more escapades with mermaids, pirates, and the Mollusks should stick with the first book. This story takes place almost exclusively in London, with Neverland probably appearing in less than ten chapters, and our main baddie is not Captain Hook. And, rather than being a fun fantasy adventure, Peter and the Shadow Thieves delves more into spooky noir (I can’t help but wonder if this was Pearson’s influence at work). All of the London scenes—which are 80% of the book—are creepy and atmospheric, and the humor is in far shorter supply than it was in Peter and the Starcatchers. I’m (mostly) okay with this trade-off: the slow build-up is immensely unsettling, like the beginning of a horror film, and the compromised security sequences at the Aster house are probably some of the series’ best work, considering how they stuck in my mind all the way into adulthood.

However, the disquieting tone of the story has a flip side: all of the books are over four hundred pages, but Peter and the Shadow Thieves is the only one that feels really slow. It takes well over three-hundred pages (more than halfway through the not) for the plot to kick in, and the dragging really starts to show. There are only so many ways we can watch Peter get deterred on his way to rescue Molly—at least, by having Peter fight the London street life, we steer away from things coming too easily to the protagonist, but Peter and the Shadow Thieves definitely takes it too far in the opposite direction. Barry and Pearson pace chapters in a quick enough way that I wouldn’t say I was ever bored, but I felt pretty close to that by the middle of the London scenes. I was also well aware that we were three hundred pages past where Peter said he was setting off to save Molly, and we still had not reached Molly. The sense of urgency and impending doom that propelled the book’s first third begins to sputter and fizzle with every time Peter is sidetracked, since a whole lot of time passes where the baddies don’t make their move and Molly just sits around uncomfortably.

But when the action kicks in, it kicks in. And if there is one thing Peter and the Shadow Thieves has that its predecessor doesn’t, it’s a terrifying villain. I loved Slank and Blank Stache in the first book, but they were more of campy caricatures than anything else. Lord Ombra, on the other hand, scared the hell out of me as a child. I would have repeated nightmares of him gliding up the staircase and into my room; even as an adult, the concept of him is just so eerie (mind-controlling oozing black monster that looks like a dementor = a recipe for terror). By my account, no scenes in any of the series are anywhere near as disturbing as the nighttime attack on Molly’s house and the standoff in the Tower of London, where Ombra causes a death that’s so grotesque and unsettling I’m honestly surprised it made it to publication in a children’s book.

We also have the introduction of George Darling, Molly’s socially awkward and geeky neighbor friend and, though his presence is basically a dead giveaway for how the Starcatchers story will ultimately tie into Barrie’s Peter Pan many years down the line, he fits into the plot of Shadow Thieves remarkably well. I’m a big fan of the Molly, Peter, and George trio, mostly because of how resentful and jealous Peter and George are of one another’s presence (this is a rare instance where a couple of guys competing for a girl’s attention actually works, mostly because they’re all so juvenile that it’s hardly even romantic), and George factors into the book’s finale so well that he actually serves a pivotal role in the plot rather than being useless filler or fan-service.

If anything, the fan-service portions feel like the parts on Neverland. As much fun as it is to watch Captain Hook battle the Lost Boys and verbally abuse Smee, these scenes feel very far away from the central London Starcatchers plot. There is, I suppose, a payoff in the next book for James’s stint as temporary leader while Peter is away, but I don’t even think it was deliberate on Barry and Pearson’s part.

Still, Peter and the Shadow Thieves has a whole lot of excitement and magic, even if it’s on a much darker and gloomier scale than the sparkling, whimsical first book. This is actually a second installment where you can see the characters grow from who they were in the first book—especially in the case of Molly, who is (literally) growing away from Peter, who is stuck in permanent boyhood—and it expands the universe of the Starcatchers in an epic, intelligent, and chilling manner. The middle certainly sags, but the story quickly regains its footing and then some. Though it’s not quite as satisfying as Peter and the Starcatchers and takes place far away from the waterfalls and jungles of Neverland, Shadow Thieves remains a wondrous piece of escapism; it’s not every day you find a sequel that works this well in combination with its predecessor in addition to telling a complete, compelling story of its own. This is middle-grade fiction at nearly its best.

3.5 stars.

Fast-paced, super delicious fun!

I have only very recently read the official sequel to the J.M Barrie, which wasn't that great and features a very unlikable Peter Pan, so I wasn't that excited about this when it come up on my tbr list.

However I should have remember how awesome the first book was! I like this series so much better than the original Peter Pan books. Peter is actually likeable in this book and the supporting characters are ones you can get behind. The baddies are proper baddies, especially Lord Ombra who was pretty creepy.

I enjoyed the change of scenery from Never Land to London. And I have a sneaky feeling Molly & George might end up being Wendy's parents.

The book is also filled with lovely illustrations. This series will keep you 'Hooked' (see what I did there? ;) )

Both of these books were good. As you can guess they're retellings of peter pan.

Barry, Dave and Ridley Pearson Peter and the Shadow Thieves, 541 p. Hyperion –

Peter is settling happily onto the island and especially enjoys tormenting Captain Hook, as he now calls Black Stache. Then another enemy returns to the island, bringing greater danger as one of the Others comes seeking the chest of starstuff. In order to protect Molly and her family, Peter must make the long voyage to England.

From the cover of the book, you may expect a retelling of Peter and Wendy’s adventure. Instead, you getting a rollicking tale that sets you up for more adventures to come – adventures you will look for with impatience.

EL, MS – ESSENTIAL