Calvin and Hobbes meets Coraline,
with a healthy dose of Edward Gorey mixed in.
- Patrick Rothfuss, describing this book

A comparison like that is a double-edged sword.

Sure, it's the kind of endorsement a writer dreams of, although it's a little less impressive when the writer says it about his own book; still, likening one's work to something as venerable and beloved as Calvin & Hobbes -- to say nothing of the wordsmithery of Neil Gaiman's Coraline and the artistic quirkiness of Edward Gorey -- is sure to pique readers' interest enough to get them to crack open a book.

But, on the other hand, that's a lot to live up to. And The Adventures of the Princess & Mr. Whiffle by Patrick Rothfuss -- well, it's cute and all, but it's no Coraline & Hobbes, no matter how much it wants to be.

Coraline, in this case, is an unnamed princess of sorts with a baby brother who's not much to her liking. Hobbes is Mr. Whiffle, her stuffed teddy bear -- he doesn't come to life like Calvin's tiger, although he does seem to participate in the young girl's adventures in stolid silence.

But The Dark of Deep Below -- the second in the Princess & Mr. Whiffle series, although I did not see the first -- never achieves the sense of wonder that Calvin did, nor does it match the dark mystery of Coraline's encounter with her other-mother from the other side. And, while I got the sense that much of our heroine's travails were more the product of her fertile imagination, the book never gives readers a sense that her life is anything other than the fantastic, adult-free environment she perceives. Part of the charm of Calvin, after all, was our ability to see Hobbes as a stuffed toy and a living, breathing tiger, and our realization that his trips through time and space often involved nothing more mystical than a cardboard box while his long-suffering parents and teacher looked on. If this princess has parents -- or any kind of life outside her world of fantasy and adventure -- we get no hint of it here.

The plot involves the princess finding her lost baby brother, Gubby, in the goblin realms below. It's not much of an adventure, since she's apparently an amazing warrior and has no reason to fear goblin hordes -- only the dark bothers her, and a sudden, somewhat ridiculous deus ex machina resolves that problem quickly and neatly.

Illustrations by Nate Taylor are cute and cartoony -- but, once again, his perfectly acceptable art suffers in comparison to Gorey. Let's face it, they're not in the same league.

And that, I guess, remains the big problem here. The Dark of Deep Below is cute. It's fine. It'll probably be lots of fun for young readers. But, by overselling himself so greatly, Rothfuss sets readers who recognize and admire his references up for a disappointment.