“The Lost Colony” finds Artemis Fowl in perhaps his best adventure to date

Artemis Fowl is not your typical hero. The Irish lad happens to be filthy rich, stinking brilliant, and perhaps the muddiest purveyor of dirty deeds. Yes, Fowl is foul. Peel away the diminutive Saville Row suits and you’ll find a criminal mastermind and undisputed genius. That’s the conceit of Eoin Colfer’s immensely entertaining and hugely popular Artemis Fowl series, whose not-so-hidden secret is that this dastardly teen really is well-intentioned—a good kid in mafioso’s clothing. In The Lost Colony: Artemis Fowl: Book 5, the jet-setting antihero is back, and this may be his most satisfying adventure to date.

Any Artemis Fowl saga makes a great gift for (a) young readers, (b) anyone who enjoys the Harry Potter books, or (c) older readers with a lighthearted sensibility, a willingness to fantasize, and an appreciation for well-written novels. What do I mean by this latter category? Well, the grown-up in question has to be willing (perhaps eager) to dive into a book that is populated by a teenage protagonist and a crowd of mythical creatures that includes crime-fighting elves, farting dwarves, and even a romance-starved centaur. Don’t worry, Colfer imbues such otherworldly beings with a good dose of humor, self-deprecation, and credibility. They’re certainly not overly earnest or viewed through the soft-focus lens of whimsy run amok—not that a measure of whimsy is a bad thing. (An acquaintance once flatly remarked to me, “I don’t do whimsy.” Now how prim and rigid is that?)

I highly recommend The Lost Colony for anyone who falls into the preceding categories. I’m one of several adults I know of who have enjoyed Artemis Fowl’s previous four adventures. (No, we do not play Dungeons and Dragons, were not the folks you saw dressed up as wizards on opening night of the last Lord of the Rings movie, and are not strangers to serious literature by authors like Annie Proulx and Philip Roth.) This fifth tale is as good as any of its predecessors. In The Lost Colony, Artemis and his elfish cohorts discover a world populated by demons—an ancient civilization in a different time-space dimension that is threatening to collide with our own. Artemis comes to the rescue, and the result is a well-paced entertainment that will leave you—and others on your gift list this holiday—smiling, laughing, and eager for more of this magical series.