Artemis Fowl

Artemis Fowl is a series of fantasy novels written by Irish author Eoin Colfer, starring the child criminal mastermind Artemis Fowl. The series is written in half-serious language, alternating dark moments with humorous ones, a style favoured by a number of popular children's authors, including J. K. Rowling (Harry Potter) and Roald Dahl (The Witches).

Artemis, the main character, is a ruthless and extremely intelligent young criminal whose main goal is the acquisition of money through a variety of schemes (although his values change towards the 5th book). The author of the series summed up the series as: "Die Hard with fairies."

Main characters

• Artemis Fowl II, the central character, is a child prodigy, similar to Mozart, for example. Artemis starts his work against the fairies by kidnapping LEPrecon captain Holly Short in order to retrieve fairy gold as a ransom. He later works with his former captive to save the world from impending doom on several occasions.
• Domovoi Butler, his bodyguard, is commonly known as Butler. In Book III, he reveals his first name to Artemis when he believes he is near death, but he is saved thanks to Artemis's use of a fish freezer and knowledge of cryonics, followed by a magical healing by Holly Short. He has a comprehensive knowledge of numerous weapons and martial arts, enough so to be able to survive an encounter with a troll. He also is Artemis's closest friend.
• Juliet Butler is the sister of Domovoi Butler and a bodyguard in training. As of Book III, however, she joins a professional wrestling team under the ringname "The Jade Princess". The following quote from the first book seems to describe Juliet's departure from the normal teenage girl's standard quite well: "For her eighteenth birthday she asked for, and received, a ribbed Judo crash vest, two weighted throwing knives and a World Wrestling Grudge Match video. She could hit a moving target with any weapon you care to name and she could throw most people a lot further than she trusted them."
• Captain Holly Short is the first female LEPrecon officer, (resigned from LEP as of Book IV, but partially rejoined as part of LEP Section 8 in Book V). Holly has a strong sense of morals and usually works based off of intuition rather than common sense, a quality that often gets her into trouble. She was accused of the murder of Julius Root, and her resignation is due to his replacement's distrust of her. She was once dead for one minute, but a time mix-up taken advantage of by Artemis Fowl saved her.
• Foaly is a centaur, and the LEP's technological genius. He is paranoid, choosing to wear tin-foil hats to protect his brain from the mind-probing rays he believes are following him, although he knows they have yet to be invented. He is also quite vain about his work and appearance. In Book V he receives a new job in Section 8.
• Commander Julius Root of the LEPrecon (deceased as of Book IV) had a military personality and a short temper that earned him the nickname of "Beetroot" (due to the fact that he turned red when angry), but also made him an ideal leader for the LEPrecon. He had the habit of smoking noxious fungus cigars and became a father-like figure to Holly Short.
• Mulch Diggums is a kleptomaniacal dwarf with incredible flatulence, who has lost his magical abilities due to breaking-and-entering human dwellings without invitations. Like all male dwarves, Mulch is adapted for tunnelling, and his unhingeable jaw and accelerated digestion have proved vital on many of his criminal ventures.
• Minerva Paradizo, is a criminal child genius who captures the imp N^o1 and tries to present him as her project for the Nobel prize award in Stockholm. Originally about two years younger than Artemis, after his jump through time, she is now about the same age and is a potential love interest for Artemis.
• N^o1, a very powerful imp warlock (Qwan's apprentice as of Book V) who helped to save Hybras. Before saving Hybras, however, he got involved with Artemis Fowl, and was kidnapped by Minerva Paradizo.
• Qwan was the most powerful of the original seven full-fledged warlocks who lifted Hybras out of time. The only warlock who survived in his petrified form, he brought Hybras back to the real world outside the Limbo with help from Artemis, Qweffor (his apprentice who was believed to be deceased, but actually trapped in N'zall a.k.a. Abbot), (N^o1), and Holly.

Villains

There is no obvious villain for the first book, as it is Artemis Fowl vs. the LEP. The minor villain is Briar Cudgeon, who tries to kill Artemis with a troll. He is the co-head of the B'wa Kell Rebellion in Book II and died in the same novel.

• Opal Koboi is the antagonist in The Opal Deception and The Arctic Incident. A truffle-obsessed, self-centered, slightly paranoid, super-genius pixie, she co-headed the B'wa Kell rebellion (Book II). She also owns Koboi Laboratories, and is a rival of Foaly. She was imprisoned in The Opal Deception, and labeled as slightly schizophrenic and a pathological liar.
• Jon Spiro is the villain of Book III. A shady, successful businessman from Chicago, he steals some a computer called the C-cube, which was made using fairy technology, from Artemis in order to use it for his own technology company, Fission Chips, and imprisoned Artemis when he could not crack its encryption. (Spiro is imprisoned in Book III)
• Goblins are the species of fairies who have lizard-like bodies and can conjure fire, and have an incredible lack of intelligence. The B'wa Kell (the equivalent of the fairy Mafia) consists of Goblins.
• In the book Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony, demons such as Leon Abbot are arguably antagonists, but characters like Number One and Qwan are ambivalent due to the aid they render to Artemis and all inhabitants of the Earth, magical and not.
• Ark Sool replaces Julius Root as the new Commander of the LEP. Foaly holds him in high contempt, and his distrust for Holly drove her to quit the LEP. He was sacked as LEP Commander during the time when Holly and Artemis were at Hybras (the demon city) in Book V.

Minor characters

Humans

• Artemis Fowl I is the father of Artemis the Second.
• Angeline Fowl is the mother of Artemis the Second.
• Arno Blunt is Spiro's bodyguard (imprisoned in Book III)
• Fowl twins, to whom Artemis becomes an older brother after his ordeal in Hybras, (mentioned very briefly in the end of the 5th book).

• Jonah Lee, A.K.A Billy Kong is a ruthless killer who tries to hunt down demon N°1 to avenge his older brother who was supposedly killed by demons, an excuse his older brother made to keep Lee inside their house as a child.

• Giovanni Zito is a dedicated and rich environmentalist. He is chosen by Opal Koboi as her adopted parent in book IV and is mentioned very briefly in the 5th book.

Fairies

In the Artemis Fowl series, "fairy" is a generic term for all supernatural creatures.

• Lieutenant/Acting Commander/Private Briar Cudgeon of the LEPrecon aided the B'wa Kell rebellion along with Opal Koboi (deceased as of Book II).
• Trouble Kelp is a LEP major, who appears to be a good friend of Holly. His younger brother gave him the nickname "Trubs"
• Wing Commander Vinyáya is the head of Section Eight of the LEP. A supporter of Julius Root, she offered Holly a job in the secretive Section Eight department in Artemis Fowl: The Lost Colony. She was one of the first to believe that Holly did not kill Root in Artemis Fowl: The Opal Deception. She was also Holly's flight instructor in the LEP academy and said that Holly "could fly a pod through the gap in your teeth". During the B'wa Kell uprising and attack on Police Plaza, she was the only council member not to retreat to the operations department; she demanded to be given an electric rifle and didn't miss once.
• Corporal Grub Kelp is Trouble's younger brother who is a coward and often refers to his "Mummy."
• Chix Verbil is a sprite in the LEP whose life was saved by Captain Holly Short in Book II. He also lent his starter chip for his shuttle to Mulch Diggums in Book IV in order to save Holly.
• Doctor Jerbal Argon is a psychiatrist in Book I and the owner of a medical clinic in Book IV.
• Doodah Day is an illegal fish marketing pixie. He took a great disliking toward Mulch, due to being swallowed up and cocooned inside slimy Dwarf spittle. He was later granted amnesty. He worked as Mulch's PI partner during the time period when Holly and Artemis disappeared in Book V.
• Leon Abbot is also known as N'zall (meaning "Little horn"), and the supposed saviour of the demons. He caused the time-spell on Hybras to go awry.
• Mervall (Merv) and Descant (Scant) Brill are the fairy twins that are accomplices to Opal Koboi. They helped wake her from her self-induced coma after serving as janitors in Jerbal Argon's clinic where she was kept.

Artemis Fowl Files

• Turnball Root is the defamed and notorious brother of Commander Julius Root.
• Major Evergreen is the fairy major in the LEP who reveals the location of the next training mission.
• Sergei is a dwarf that leads a theater troupe of six dwarves.
• The Significants are the dwarves within Sergei's band.

Books in the Series

1. Artemis Fowl (2001)
2. Artemis Fowl: The Arctic Incident (2002)
3. Artemis Fowl: The Eternity Code (2003)
4. Artemis Fowl: The Opal Deception (2005)
5. Artemis Fowl and the Lost Colony (2006)
6. Artemis Fowl and the Time Paradox

Others

• Artemis Fowl: The Seventh Dwarf (2004) (Short story specially written for World Book Day 2004)
• The Artemis Fowl Files (2004)
• Artemis Fowl: The Graphic Novel

Artemis Fowl movie

There is an Artemis Fowl movie scheduled to come out sometime in 2008. Confirmation is provided below by Eoin Colfer himself.

In a 2002 BBC interview, the author Eoin Colfer named Lawrence Guterman as the director. Colfer said that he was "especially glad that they are going to be looking for an Irish Artemis.". This has now been proven false, by Eoin Colfer himself. Lawrence Guterman is not, in fact, directing the movie or has any part in it.

In a 2007 Artemis Fowl Confidential interview, Colfer stated the following:

I have been working intermittently on the screenplay for the past year with Jim Sheridan the Irish director. We have kept the heart of books one and two but I also wanted to do something cinematic and spectacular so we added a big exciting ending. No new characters but plenty of new one liners. I really love the story and we hope to go into production this Summer. No cast yet.

External links

• The official Artemis Fowl website
• The official site of Eoin Colfer
• The Artemis Fowl fan site
• An Artemis Fowl Wiki