Okay, I know I am not supposed to go around judging books by their covers, but frankly, Gideon the Cutpurse deserves a look for the cover alone. Seriously, you should head to your local bookstore and check it out. Lucky for me, the book lived up to the cover. I haven't read a good time travel story in a good long while, so I very much enjoyed the first volume in Linda Buckley-Archer's projected trilogy.

The book opens with Peter, who is disappointed once again by his workaholic father. He and his au pair head out to the country, and spend the day with Kate and her family. But Kate's families aren’t farmers. Her father works for some fancy acronym heavy agency, and he and his partner are doing some experiments involving dark matter. Kate and Peter have a bit of a run in with this anti-matter thingy (I'm not overly clear on the physics of the whole business, and fortunately, Buckley-Archer doesn't go into it too much) and they end up in 1763. And a creepy guy called the Tar Man steals their contraption, leaving them with no way to get back home. Fortunately, the Tar Man was in hot pursuit of one Gideon Seymour, and he helps them out. The kids end up meeting all sorts of 18th century types, both famous and not, and having all sorts of adventures. I don't want to ruin the ending, but suffice to say, I am definitely excited for book number two.

Occasionally I found myself thinking that Buckley-Archer was a little simplistic in her explanations, or that people's reactions weren't fully what I expected from the situations at hand, but when I really thought about it, I realized that those kinds of details really make this book a lot more accessible to a younger reader. I probably wouldn't give this one to anyone much over 13, as I think a more sophisticated reader would find things a bit too undemanding, but for the 9-13 set this book is right on.

Gideon the Cutpurse by Linda Buckley-Archer
ISBN 1416915257
416 pages