Fly by Night

De: Frances Hardinge

Narrado por: Jill Tanner

Winner of the Branford Boase award, Fly By Night is the stunning YA fantasy novel from Frances Hardinge, author of the Costa Award winning The Lie Tree.

As the realm struggles to maintain an uneasy peace after years of civil war and tyranny, a twelve-year-old orphan called Mosca Mye and her loyal companion, a cantankerous goose, are about to become the unlikely heroes of a radical revolution.

Mosca is on the run, heading for the city of Mandelion. There she finds herself living by her wits among cut-throat highwaymen, spies and smugglers. With peril at every turn, Mosca uncovers a dark plot to terrorize the people of Mandelion, and soon merry mayhem leads to murder . . .

Fly By Night has an unforgettable cast of characters and an inspiring message at its heart – sometimes the power of words can change the world.

Fly By Night is followed by its thrilling sequel, Twilight Robbery.

©Frances Hardinge 2005 (P)2019 Macmillan Digital Audio

Reseñas de la Crítica

'Everyone should read Frances Hardinge. Everyone. Right now' - Patrick Ness, author of A Monster Calls

Step into another world...

This is my second Frances Hardinge book. The first read was "A Face like Glass" It was a unique story with an amazing world that just drew you into it dispite its strangeness. Its why I decided to listen to another story and chose "Fly by Night". I was not disappointed! Again, another strange world with unique laws, rules, society, religion, politics & characters, but now in light of our countries obsessive focus on issues of politics, laws, religion, society and characters, the strangeness seemed much more familiar and ridiculous.
The story of Mosca Mai is unique on many levels and she is a worthy, if flawed Heroine that you can absolutely get behind because just like us, she is trying to understand where she fits in the society. If only we could all have an ally like Seracen, her slightly crazed goose, to fight some of our battels!
I am now an absolute fan of Frances Hardinage and will be jumping into some more adventerous worlds to see just how deep the rabbit hole goes. If you enjoy unique worldbuilding, characters who are slightly outrageous yet quite familiar to people you might know and how they find their way through the story, this is the author for you.
Enjoy!

Stop that Coffee House! Or, Adventures or Endings?

In the first chapter of Frances Hardinge’s Fly By Night (2005), A Is for Arson (each chapter title begins with a letter of the alphabet in alpabetical order), twelve-year-old Mosca Mye, daughter of the exiled and deceased scholar Quillam Mye, is hiding in the town magistrate’s dovecote with her pugnacious goose Saracen, chewing on her unlit pipe, nursing rebellion. They are out to rescue an eloquent wandering con man being punished for bamboozling the locals of the soggy village Chough. Why does Mosca want to rescue the splendidly named Eponymous Clent? Because, what with her father’s books having all been burned and her uncle having been exploiting her, Mosca is starved for words, and Clent has a gargantuan vocabulary. Thus, she (and Saracen) make their way to the Chiding Stone to which Clent has been chained to inform him, “You tell lies for money. I want a job.” After defending himself (“I am a poet and a storyteller. Pray do not confuse the metaphoric meaning of words with mendacity”), he accepts her as his secretary, despite her revealing that she’s just burnt down her uncle’s mill, and the unlikely pair start their uneasy (for them) and entertaining (for us) relationship.

The book moves through different overlapping stages: road movie, river yarn, city story, murder mystery, political intrigue, and coming of age.

Mosca is great. “She is as sharp as a hornet’s britches,” “A feretty looking girl with unconvincing eyebrows.” She possesses “a wealth of rage in [her] stick-like frame” and wakes up by “flinging out her fists left and right.” “Her eyes had a way of looking venomous,” and she likes “books with gizzards and gunpowder in them.” Underestimate or mess with her at your peril. Yearning to learn, she will be sorely tested and tempted and tried by events and enemies she thought were friends and friends she thought were enemies.

Clent proves to be an unreliable mentor. Given to saying things like, “I am little enough pleased to find myself having to think for two without shackling myself in perpuity,” he manipulates reality and history to suit his agenda: “Clent simply swept such memories away with the impatience of someone shoving crockery aside so that he can spread a treasure map across a table. The facts fell to the floor with a fractured tinkle and were forgotten.” Is he really a poet? Or a spy? Or a murderer? He is not to be trusted—but then neither is Mosca. Luckily they are both coolly resourceful.

They meet many other savory characters along the way. There is Saracen the “murderous goose,” (don’t try to confine him below decks or he might take over your vessel); Captain Partridge (a smuggler out for justice and revenge); Linden Colrabi (a warm-milk-voiced spy catcher); Hopewood Pertellis (an idealistic “radical” lawyer/teacher); Lady Tamarind (the porcelain-white, scar-faced sister of the Duke of Mandelion); Black Captain Blythe, a dashing highwayman destined to be famous in ballads; Mabwick Tote, the highly educated, ruthless Stationers’ Guild chief; Aramai Goshawk, the brilliant, ambitious Locksmiths’ Guild chief; various street urchins who want to go to the “Alley School” and learn about tyranny and truth; and more.

In the absence of a unifying king, Mosca and Clent move through “the Fractured Realm,” fragmented into rivalrous cities and towns, as guilds like the Locksmiths (in charge of security to the point of extortion), the Stationers (in charge of the printed word to the point of oppression), and the Watermen (in charge of trade and boats to the point of monopoly) jockey for power, spying on and sabotaging each other.

Religion is interesting. Hardinge imagines a myriad “Beloveds” (Catholic saint analogues comprised of former local deities) like Doris of the Whimsical Dream and “the Consequence” (a Protestant God analogue). People are still traumatized by the ten-year reign of terror of the Birdcatchers, who before Mosca was born seized power through religious mania and terrorism and were into burning Beloveds and their followers. Luckily, they are all gone now, right?

The pistols and snuff and printing presses and wigs and quill pens and gin give off a 17th-century England vibe. There are ale houses with cool names like The Simpering Squirrel and The Strangled Bird. Marriage houses, where drunk people come to tie the knot. Coffeehouses, too, though they are not confined to land but pulled by giant kites may float up and down river. This leads to remarkable lines like, “Follow that coffeehouse!”

Hardinge writes cool wisdom for young readers, like “If you want someone to tell you what to think, you will never be short of people willing to do so.” There are moral or ethical dilemmas aplenty, like when Mosca has to decide what to tell Lady Tamarind, if anything, about Clent’s activities or what to do with a highly sought after printing press and what to say about what she does with it.

She writes vivid, savory, and original descriptions, like “his expression something like that of a child who has learned about death for the first time,” “His mouth grew small and round as an unripe plum,” “a noise like paper children applauding,” and “An unsmiling little man of fifty, with a gnawed yellow look like an apple core. His wig frightened Mosca. It was so lustrous and long, so glossy and brown, one could think it had sucked the life out of the little man whom it seemed to wear.”

Jill Tanner reads the audiobook with understanding, clarity, wit, and aplomb.

The plot is full of event, action, suspense, and revelation. Perhaps the denoument is a little less interesting than everything that leads up to it, but that’s the way most mysteries work, and the narrative world and characters and writing are so compelling that I want to go on and read the next book in the series. After all, this one would rather end with adventure than a happy ending.

superb

Francis hardinge does it again! this beautifully written and voiced story is probably her most complex. themes pertaining to free speech and the complexities of deciding whom to trust are handled with her usual flair, depth, and lack of heavy-handedness. the conclusion, and final several pages are so poignant and beautifully written they almost brought tears to my eyes. hardinge is a treasure and deserves more credit than she has gotten thus far. every one of her books should have been optioned by now and turned into blockbuster movies or limited serious for the BBC or HBO or something!

Amazing book, dreadful narrator

This book is fantastic, and I couldn't wait to listen to it. Alas, the narrator was so affected and over-dramatic. She took over the book. Sigh.