Artemis Fowl: The Eternity Code

Published Information

Author:	Eoin Colfer
Series:	Artemis Fowl #3
Published:	May 2003
Genre:	Fantasy
Pages:	320

Ratings

Violence:	PG-13 (Scenes of violence, concussion grenade shatters teeth of several people)
Sexual Content:	G
Language:	PG
Reading Age:	Junior High
Buy Recommend:	Hardbound (Great book, family will read multiple times)
Overall Rating:	8 out of 10 (Exciting, page turner, well thought out)

Plot Summary

Now that Artemis' mother and father are safe and back at home, his parents are trying to convince him to leave the family business of crime (which they are doing) and do something good. Artemis decides he needs to pull one more big money making scheme and then he will be done. He builds a cube based on fairy computers and his own intellegence that can read anything (translates, cracks codes, hooks into networks and satellite feeds, etc). Basically it can do just about anything to computer systems and information. He scheme is to threaten a big time criminal billionare, Jon Spiro, that Artemis will release the cube to the market now (and destroy Jon's investments, etc) if the Jon doesn't pay him a huge sum of money. The go through a demonstration of the cubes powers and Jon recognizes what the cube can do. Unfortunately, Jon prepared for the meeting and steels the cube, injuring Bulter.

During the demonstration, one of the systems that is tapped is the fairy system Fouly has created for the People. From the tap, they now know someone human can find out about the fairies and they send Holly Short to investigate. Holly shows up in time to find and heal Artemis and Butler. As they talk, they realize they have to help each other, once again, to recover the cube before Jon Spiro is able to break Artemis' code and activate the cube for his own purposes. However, the fairies have one requirement. Since the problem for the fairies is happening because of Artemis' scheme, he has to submit to a mind wipe after they have recovered the cube.

Comments

As the books have progressed, it has been fun watching Artemis change. By the end of this book, Artemis has developed morales, is willing to help because it is the right thing to do, and forms friendships. But the best part of this progression, especially as seen in this installment, is that changing to become a better person doesn't mean that you don't have to face the consequences of your past actions.

For example, even though they are able to pull off the rescue (I can't imagine anyone reading this would be shocked by that revelation...), Butler has aged 15-20 years and is not as mobile as he once was, and Artemis must still submit to a mind wipe. Grant it, it is understood by the fairies as well as the reader that Artemis will try and beat the wipe, but that is for another review... Anyway, the point is that even when we do change, we still have to pay the piper for what we have done in the past. We can atone for it, but consequences often times can't be skipped.