Krabat by Otfried Preussler is the story of a teenage beggar-boy called Krabat, who is lured to a mysterious mill dominated by a sinister miller, known as the Master. The Master takes on Krabat not only as an apprentice miller but also as an apprentice in a secret magic brotherhood.

The story is set in Saxony in the early eighteen century and is a rite of passage story. It is told in a simple, but descriptive style that lends itself to central European folktales from which Krabat originates. This does help to create the type of resonance with a reader of any age who knows Grimms’ Fairy Tales and acts to ease them quickly into the narrative of the book.

The characters come over as three dimensional and people a reader will care about. As the constant sense of peril is never far away, the persistent undercurrent of disquiet creates an urgency to read on and see what happens.

This is not a light-hearted story of boy wizards, but something far more complex and dark. Krabat certainly has the feel of a classic, ensuring it will be handed down from one generation to another. It also is the type of book that is just right for reading as nights begin to draw in and Halloween approaches. Although, because Krabat is such an engaging tale, younger readers may find themselves wrestling for possession of it from their parents.

A weirdly compelling, dark folktale. It's like what you would get if Hermann Hesse and Mikhail Bulgakov lived in the 1960s/70s and decided to write a children's book together. It's a little dated, not because it's set in the 17th century but because of its writing style and more importantly its unexamined separation of male and female characters (something that always irks me). Otherwise, it's rather a cool little tale about power and freedom, and an anthropologically interesting depiction of Lusatia.