Review - Project M by Milan Hofmans

Genre: childrens, fantasy, science fiction, mystery
Pages: 156
Rating: 4/5 stars
Goodreads

Summary
Madhu Mahavir has an extraordinary ability. Together with his uncle Ranga, a famous doctor, he travels to the mountain village Fontelmiro to research the mysterious disease professor Shiverling is suffering from.


Soon it appears something exceptionnel is hidden at the remote Shiverling estate. Six days follow, in which Madhu and Ranga find out more and more about the professor's disease and the fairylike Project M, on which the Shiverlings have been working for generations.


My thoughts
I recently picked up a book by this author not knowing to much about it and was pleasantly surprised, so I decided to pick up one of his childrens books. What I loved most about the other book was the interesting and original world Hofmans created. Project M again features a very imaginative world which is vividly described. I loved how some things are very familiar to our own world, but other things are very different. I'm not always a fan of books that are science fiction but also feature magical creatures, but for this book I thought it worked well.
I thought the mystery in the book was interesting and I liked how at first you are led to believe one thing, while later you realise that the truth is very different. The only thing about this book that I did not like that much was that the badguy, once he was discovered, revealed his master plan to the main character. I have always found it a bit annoying when that happens in movies or books, becaue I cannot really see that happening in real life. Even if it does, it doesn't happen that often. I feel like it is a trope that is used a little to often for convenience.
Eventhough this book is a finished story on its own, Hofmans wrote another book featuring Madhu Mahavir and I'm sure I'll be reading that one too.

The book was originally written in Dutch and so far no English translation has been written.