Lead Review

  • Book: Matti and Max: Adventures on Crete
  • Location: Matala
  • Author: Sandra Lehmann

Review Author: tripfiction

Location

Content

This is not the first time we have featured a story set in and around the Matala Caves, where even Joni Mitchell lived for a while (remember “under a starry dome…beneath the Matala Moon”?). A hippie community, when flower power was at its height in the 1960s, the caves attracted all kinds of nomadic folk to live a simple, communal life.

Matti and Max is a children’s adventure story but if you would like to read an adult novel set there, look no further than The Secret Life of Alfred Nightingale by Rebecca Stonehill.

The two youngsters, Matti and Max are spending their summer holiday with their respective families, based at Matala. They have never met before but form a natural friendship, and together they start to explore the island. They meet Frank who tells them he is one of the original hippies from the 1960s, he describes himself as  “Matala’s last flower child”, still camped out in a tent, although there seem to be some unpleasant dynamics between him and one of the locals, Yannis and his dog Kostas.

Early on the boys are to be found exploring the caves, and they happen to come across a treasure map, but it is indecipherable to them. They decide to enlist the help of Vicky, a bright friend from back home in Germany who looks just a little like Harry Potter – and is as bright as they come!

Adventures and Crete are fundamental to this delightful story, and a good choice of read for the under 10s if Crete is a planned  family holiday. There are some nice illustrations to accompany the text.

The book is translated from the German and is very much American English. There are one or two hiccups in translation and turns of phrase that can be a little jarring and I guess if children are going to read this, the text needs to be spot on (…”a man called George, the fisher, on the other hand…” /  “a nightly visit” when it was in fact a single visit at night time / it is ok in English to keep the word ‘taverna’ and translating it to ‘tavern’ doesn’t fit so well, as a ‘tavern’ is an old fashioned pub in the UK). It is nevertheless a good caper as the two boys encounter smugglers, go for swims and hikes and familiarise themselves with the island from their home base in Matala – to Chania and Preveli Beach and beyond.

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