Marco Loristan, a twelve-year-old refugee, and his friend, a hunchback orphan named The Rat, embark on a dangerous journey across Europe to bring freedom to Marco's beleaguered homeland of Samavia.
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I felt like reading another Burnett after rereading A Little Princess, and this was sitting on my e-reader. I had read it long ago, in what I recall was an abridged edition. Perhaps it was abridged to tighten up the story and make it drag less for younger readers ... in this version, compared to the snappy theatrics of Princess, it was notably lacking in dramatic tension, with a possible villain who totally disappeared in the middle, and an excruciatingly looooooong period during which the reader knows the “secret” the protagonist unbelievably never seems to have guessed. Odd, when Burnett's other books are much more satisfyingly constructed.
In the end, I wondered if it was really an allegory of the Second Coming. The returning prince is described in such overtly religious terms that he hardly seems human, and his mission will be to bring his people “the way” and “the law” (meaning a spiritual law, not a civic law). Interesting, but heavy-handed.
