'Lily and Tom travel the county with Ma Hawker, enthralling crowds with their amazing collection of curios. Always on the lookout for new wonders, Lily is tricked into buying a worthless bag of rubbish. But hidden within is a special piece of scrimshaw. A young woman called Flora Meriweather is desperate to buy the scrimshaw, hoping it can help her solve a mystery surrounding her late mother. But someone else also wants to get his hands on the scrimshaw and ensure that secrets stay hidden in the past. Can the Curio Collectors help the truth come to light?'
The Curio Collectors opens on a warm summers day in 1896, where we meet 12-year-old Lily and her younger brother Tom, who are searching though the waters of a small stream, looking for interesting pieces and junk. The two of them live with Ma Hawker, an elderly woman who took the two children in years ago, and has been raising them to help her with her curio collection. The three of them find interesting objects and travel around the country, telling made up stories about their pieces, raising money from interested locals; and hopefully selling the odd piece or two to rich folk looking for interesting objects to brag about owning.
The three of them have a fairly simple, but meagre life, and are usually always struggling to make money. Because of this they've had to learn to become resourceful, fixing up broken items, scavenging for supplies, and moving on before the locals turn on them. As the three of them head towards London, the kids meet a boy trying to sell a case filled with what he calls curios, claiming to own a part of a mummy amongst other rare objects. Lily and Tom trade the last of the money for the case, but learn that all they've bought is some old junk. The only piece that Ma Hawker picks out is an old shell with some carvings made into it.
When they arrive in London and start to wow the crowds with their collection they're approached by not one, but two people to buy the shell. One is a young maid who can barely afford the asking price, whilst the other is a sinister gentleman who's very rich. When the man tries to break into their caravan one night the kids know that he's up to no good, and so set out to get to the bottom of the mystery of why the shell is so important.
The Curio Collectors is an interesting historical mystery story that I think a lot of kids are going to enjoy. One of the best things about the book is that its lead characters are very different people than you'd usually get in this kind of story. Lily and Tom are travellers, and they, along with Ma Hawker, face issues like having to find places to stay, of having locals turn on them and demand money from them with the threat of violence, and having to struggle to get by in a system that's designed to hurt people like them. There's no real evidence in the book to say outright that they're gypsy or Roma people, but the artwork of their caravan, and their lifestyle do hint that they may be; and if they're not the book is still touching on issues faced by the GRT community to this day. With so little focus given over to GRT communities, and with almost no stories with them as the protagonists and heroes, it's absolutely wonderful to see this book going in that direction.
The mystery of the book itself is also a pretty interesting one, and it went in some places that I wasn't expecting. Eloise Williams has put a lot of twists and turns into the story, and keeps the reader guessing as to what might come next. I had a wonderful time with the story, and wish that the book had been longer so that more time could have been given over to the mystery and adventure elements, which were introduced towards the latter part of the book.
Despite the short length, the book was still very engaging and engrossing, and a large part of this was down to the lead characters. Lily and Tom were both great protagonists, and it was lovely to see Lily getting to break expectations of how girls are normally portrayed in a historical setting such as this. She's very proactive, she rushes into danger, she climbs trees and gets into things. She's given a lot of agency; which is something that I've noticed with a lot of Barrington Stoke's younger female protagonists, and is delightful to see.
The book also features illustrations by Anna Shepeta, who provides the art for the cover of the book. The interior art is, unlike the cover, presented in black and white, yet still manage to be vibrant and engaging. The artwork is lovely to see, and helps to make it clearer for younger readers who might not be fully aware of the kinds of clothing people wore in this time period, or what places looked like. The illustrations means that the text doesn't have to spend its limited time describing all of the tiny details.
The Curio Collectors was a fun read, and one that I was sad to see come to an end. Lily and Tom were great protagonists, and I'd love to see them come back again in the future. The good thing about the way they travel around, discovering interesting things, is that I can easily see them coming back for more adventures. Hopefully this will be something that Williams will be able to bring us in the future.
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