Captain Holly Short is unconvinced, and discovers that Artemis is suffering from Atlantis Complex, a psychosis common among guilt-ridden fairies - not humans - and most likely triggered by Artemis’s dabbling with fairy magic. Symptoms include obsessive-compulsive behavior, paranoia, multiple personality disorder and, in extreme cases, embarrassing professions of love to a certain feisty LEPrecon fairy.
Unfortunately, Atlantis Complex has struck at the worst possible time. A deadly foe from Holly’s past is intent on destroying the actual city of Atlantis. Can Artemis escape the confines of his mind – and the grips of a giant squid – in time to save the underwater metropolis and its fairy inhabitants?
I’ve been a fan of Eoin Colfer and The Artemis Fowl series for years now. I’ve read pretty much everything Colfer’s written and pretty much loved all of it. That said I honestly feel The Atlantis Complex was one of Colfer’s weakest books in the Fowl series.
The story revolves around Artemis losing his mind. The once great mastermind has finally come up against the one thing he can’t plan against, the degeneration of his brain. The Atlantis Complex is painted as something similar to an advanced case of OCD, paranoia, and multiple personality disorder all rolled up into one horrific disease.
As the story unfolds we being to see the old Artemis return, but only briefly in-between the immersion of Artemis’s other persona, Orion. Orion is an annoying, stereotypical knight in shinning armor wanting type of guy. We are meant to dislike him, but personally I feel Colfer did to well of a job in this. Orion is painful to read and I found myself wanting to skim over hos dialog just to get back to the “good stuff”.
I understand why Colfer made the decision he did about having Artemis’s mind deteriorate, as he had beaten everything else, but I just wish it were better. Personally I felt like it was a longer version of a novella that could have been cut a few hundred pages and no one would be the wiser.
That said, I’m still a huge fan of the series. Colfer leaves off in one of the first true cliffhangers in the series, and I personally can’t wait to read the next in the series. The characters were still engaging, the story still fast paced, and the overall book still well written, I’ve just come to expect a higher caliber of book from Mr. Colfer over the years. And while this book would be a masterpiece for other authors, I feel I’ve become spoiled with the constant level of sensationalism that surrounds his books.
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