The Thief Lord

12-year-old Prosper and his 5-year-old brother Bo are on the run in Venice. On their trail is Victor Getz, a bumbling detective hired by an aunt who, following their mother’s death, wishes to separate them by adopting Bo and placing Prosper in boarding school. Initially, they join three other child runaways who have made a home of a disused cinema. Their lives are sustained by petty theft and protected by teenage Scipio, a young man who, in one of the novel’s numerous twists, turns out to be very different from what he originally seems. As Victor Getz reflects on first discovering Scipio’s real identity, the world is full of surprises. It is this element of surprise that the story triumphantly celebrates, through its ingenious plotting and its convincing moves between the worlds of childhood and adulthood, their shared losses, disappointments and moments of recovery and joy. The grandeur and decay of the Venetian setting, its misty alleyways, its heraldic lions and its many masks provide a wonderfully atmospheric dimension to a totally absorbing narrative. Translated by Oliver Latsch from the original German, this has to be one of the highlights of the children’s literature year.