magic

The Raven King

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ravenkingby Maggie Stiefvater
First sentence: “Richard Gansey III had forgotten how many times he had been told he was destined for greatness.”
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Others in the series: The Raven Boys, The Dream Thieves, Blue Lilly, Lilly Blue
Content: Like the others, this is intense, heavy on the swearing and violence.

I’m always a little sad when a series I’ve loved for years comes to an end. I get so invested, waiting for each one, that it almost feels anticlimactic when it actually comes to an end. I feel let down that I no longer will get to look forward to visiting with characters I love, following their story through pages.

Sometimes, my expectations are too high and while I like the ending, I’m not wholly satisfied with it. However, this was not the case with the last in the Raven Cycle. (No, I didn’t read the others in anticipation. Maybe I should have.) Maggie Stiefvater has come up with an ending that is so perfect for the series, that captures everything, that ends it so wonderfully, that I am genuinely sad that I will not get to visit this world again. (Well, I mean, I can always re-read, but there will be nothing NEW.)

The plot is really immaterial: there’s something attacking Cabeswater, Blue and the boys are dealing with Great Things and small things. There’s a new character, Henry, who has showed up as a minor character before (or at least I got that impression, since, you know, I didn’t reread), but I fell in love with him as much as I do Blue and the boys. He melded perfectly into the Raven Boys, and played a pivotal role in the narrative; he wasn’t just window dressing. And while the psychics weren’t as much a part of this — it is a YA novel after all — I did love them and Mr. Gray when they showed up. The sum total? It really was everything I could have hoped for in the end.

Maggie’s going to be at Watermark Friday night. I’m going to be a basket case, gushing at her about this. It’s going to be wonderful as this ending.

A Darker Shade of Magic

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darkershadeby V. E. Schwab
First sentence: “Kell wore a very peculiar coat.”
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Content: There are three f-bombs, some reference to sex (but none actual) and a lot of violence. That said, I think it’d be a good crossover for the high school set. It’s in the Science Fiction/Fantasy section of the bookstore.

I want you to know up front that whatever I write here won’t do this book any sort of justice. I really do need to work on an elevator speech for this one at work, because it really is THAT good, and I’d love it if more people read it. But, summing up the plot? Not as easy as it sounds.

Kell is many things: a brother, a prince, a magician, a smuggler. He lives in what he calls “Red” London, a world of magic and opulence, where the Thames runs red with blood. The reason he needs to give it a marker other than the city name is because Kell is one of the few people (well, really only two) who can travel between worlds. He moves through doors of his own making to “Grey” London (ours, set in the early-1800s) to “White” London (an incredibly violent and vicious place), but never, ever to Black London. That’s been sealed off from the other worlds after the magic there went bad and began killing people. However, when Kell accidentally brings a token from Black London back into his world, he discovers that he’s created a problem almost too big for him to handle.

I didn’t even mention Lila… a thief and pirate wannabe that Kell picks up in Grey London, who ends up being more than a sidekick.

Seriously: I don’t know where to start with this. It feels like a Gaiman novel, rich and opulent with its world-building, and yet Schwab never forgets the plot (not to mention the palpable tension when Kell’s life is on the line, multiple times). It twists and turns and weaves and is just unputdownable.

It’s also nice that it comes to a conclusion (albeit a bit rushed, but that’s often the case for me in fantasy novels), while leaving the door open for the sequel. Which, of course, I can’t wait to get my hands on.

The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle

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charmedchildrenby Janet Fox
First sentence: “It is 1863.”
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Review copy provided by the publisher.
Release date: March 15, 2016
Content: There’s some scary imagery, and the narrative is a bit confusing. I’d give it to a precocious 3rd grader, but definitely 4th and up. It will be in the Middle Grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

At first glance (at least for me), this looks like a kind of off-beat historical fiction. It’s the middle of WWII, and the children in London are being sent out to the countryside in order to escape the bombing. Kat and her siblings Robbie and Amelie are among those kids sent away, in this case to a castle in Scotland where a boarding school of sorts has been set up.

But things aren’t always what they seem. Including this book.

Rookskill Castle is a dark place (and not just because fall in Scotland is dreary), and the lady of the castle is up to something. Kat is sensible and practical, and not at all inclined to believe that what it going on could be dark magic.

And yet.

I loved this book, with reservation. On the one hand, the story was compelling — by the end, I was flying through it — and I adored Kat. She was practical, mechanically-minded and good at math, all things you don’t usually get from fantasy heroines. She was also willing to admit when she’s scared, and the boys were mostly willing to support her in the decisions that had to be made.

However,  I have issues when I know more than the characters. Fox flits back and forth through time, from WWII backwards to the mid-1800s, in order to give the reader the backstory of the castle. I’m not the most careful reader, and so I was able to piece things together before the characters did. I’ll admit it kind of heightened the tension — I wanted Kat to figure things out before they got too bad — but I was also annoyed that it took her so long. In the end, I found I didn’t mind so much, but it did niggle at the back of my mind while I was reading,.

The magic, however, was great. I loved the way Fox wove good vs. dark magic, and how it was a very practical sort of magic as well. That much — plus the  general, overall creepiness — definitely nakes the book worth reading.

Rebel of the Sands

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rebelofthesandsby Alwyn Hamilton
First sentence: “They said the only folks who belonged in Deadshot after dark were the ones who were up to no good.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Release date: March 8, 2016
Review copy provided by the publisher.
Content: There’s some pretty disturbing violence near the end of the book. It’s in the YA section (grades 6-8) of the bookstore.

The store’s Penguin children’s rep (whom I adore, and not just because she’s got an Irish accent) told me when she handed me the ARC of this book that it was Totally Brilliant and that I was going to Totally Love It. (Just imagine that in an Irish accent. She’s great.) I said okay, I’ll read it. And then it got stuck on the back burner. Things crept up, and then A stole it from me and plowed through it. And she said that it was really really good and I should totally read it. And still it was on the back burner.

(This is less a review a more of a “why didn’t I read this SOONER” post. Sorry.)

But then a day came when I was shuffling through my shelves and piles looking for something Really Good, and this finally Called to me.

And as I plowed through the first two chapters — in which our heroine, Amani Al’Hiza finds herself in a shooting contest in order to get out of her dead-end desert town and away from her lecherous uncle and demanding aunt — and was hooked. Seriously. I was reminded of Harry from The Blue Sword and of Katsa from Graceling and I was in love. I plowed through this book like I didn’t have to work or do dishes or manage four kids in the house.  (Some people are calling it East Meets West — it’s set in a Middle Eastern-like country, with djinn but there’s guns — but I disagree. Sure, it’s pulling on all influences, but I really didn’t get the whole “Western” vibe. It’s a fantasy with guns instead of swords. I can go with that.) I loved the characters (yeah, so I called the love interest from the first chapter, but I did love the twists that came), I loved the complexity of the mythology Hamilton created, I loved that she didn’t give me a clean ending. (I didn’t love that it’s probably not a stand-alone, but at least it came to a conclusion.) It definitely hit all the right buttons for me.

Which leads me to say, don’t do what I did and put this one off. It really is THAT good.

Amulet: Firelight

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firelightby Kazu Kibuishi
First sentence: “Okay, Emily. I think this is a good place to start.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: The Stonekeeper, The Stonekeeper’s Curse, The Cloud Searchers, The Last Council, Prince of the Elves, Escape from Lucien
Content: There’s a lot going on, and sometimes the vocabulary is a bit challenging, it’s good for a strong 2nd or 3rd grade reader. It’s in the middle grade (grades 3-5) graphic novel section of the bookstore.

Picking up where we left off in the last book…

The powers of the stone are getting more, well, powerful. Emily’s nightmares are beginning to become more intense, and her control over the stone is slipping. And yet, she and Trellis head to Algos Island to recover Trellis’s memories, so they can defeat his father, the evil Elf King. Navin meanwhile, needs to head back to the resistance and there’s a delightful side trip with a sassy robot chef (and an encounter with some elf bounty hunters) before he does. But everything (as it often happens with epic adventures) doesn’t go according to their plan.

I feel like a broken record with this series. I love it, I buy it, I read it, and I want the next one immediately. (I’m kind of beginning to think that I should have waited until all 9 were out… But then I might not have started.) I adore Kibuishi’s art. I can sense where the story is going, but I’m also wondering how it all fits together. (Mostly because I forget parts from one book to the next. I really should do a reread one of these days.) But, I’m not going to give up on Emily, Trellis and Navin. I most definitely want to see how their story ends.

Especially after this installment.

Audio book: The Buried Giant

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buriedgiantby Kazuo Ishiguro
Read by: David Horovitch
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There’s some violence and mild sexual elements. But, no worse than any Tolkein book. In fact, if you’ve made it through LOTR, you will probably really like this one.

Axl and Beatrice have had a long, good life. Or, at least as much as they can remember. They live in a cave dwelling in Britain, in the time after the Romans left and Arthur’s peace with the Saxons is waning. They’re not quite content, and so they determine that they need to head to a nearby village to see their son — whom they only can barely remember having — because he’s anxiously waiting for them.

They have no idea how their journey will go, or the people they will meet (an elder Sir Gawain among them, much to my delight), and how it will all change them.

I’m not sure how much more of the actual plot I want to divulge. Much like LOTR (which this strongly reminded me of), the plot is less important than the journey. Axl and Beatrice’s journey — though we never really got inside Beatrice’s head, which disappointed me — was a grand one, like Odysseus, or Frodo. The people the met, the friendships they made, the emotional journey they took as well as the physical one all had a mythological quality to it.

I’m sure you can find a lot of deeper meaning in the story as well. But for me, listening to it on my way to and from Dallas (the narrator was excellent, once I got used to his cadence), it was more a long oral narrative, a story to be heard by the firelight over several nights, a story to capture the imagination and to be swept up in.

Which means it’s being told by a master storyteller. And I loved every minute.

Nimona

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nimonaby Noelle Stevenson
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Content: There’s violence and some more mature content. I’d give it to a 5th grader if they asked, though. It’s in the teen graphic novel section of the bookstore.
I’ve been  meaning to get to this one for ages, and being shorlisted for the Graphic Novels Cybils kind of gave me the push. That, and Alyssa over at Everead told me I wouldn’t regret buying it.

She’s right: I don’t regret it at all. It really is that good. (Well, I do regret it a little, because now I have to wait for a copy to come back in so I can put it on my recommends shelf.)

It’s hard to write about this one, though. Mostly because not knowing a whole lot is part of the fun. Know this: it’s a unique fantasy world, both high- and low-tech at the same time. It’s about heroes and villains and what it means to be both. It’s about sidekicks and friendship and Being True to Yourself.

What it’s not: Trite.

Nimona is a fantastic character, fully her own person, beating her own drum, and all the other cliches. Except this feels like the furthest things from a cliche there is. She’s incredibly compelling (though not always likable) to read about. Sir Blackheart, the villain to whom Nimona is sidekick, is also incredibly fascinating. As is Ambrosious, Sir Blackheart’s nemesis. There’s so much going on here that it’s hard to do it justice.

So, just do yourself a favor an read it. You won’t regret it.

A Dragon’s Guide to the Care and Feeding of Humans

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dragonsguideby Laurence Yep and Joanne Ryder
First sentence: ”
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Content: It’s short, there are lots of pictures, and the words aren’t terribly difficult. It’s a great bridge book between beginning chapter and middle reader, and good for ages 7 and up. It’s in the middle reader (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

Miss Drake, a dragon who has been around a long time, is happy with her lifestyle. Sure her “pet”, a human she calls Fluffy, recently died and she is grieving that. But when another human, the 10-year-old great-niece of Fluffy (aka Great-Aunt Amelia), comes into her life, she is not at all happy with it.

And thus begins the relationship between Miss Drake and Winnie. Sure, there’s a little adventure with a magical sketchbook and a rabid magic-eating monster, but mostly it’s about overcoming grief of the death of a loved one (Winnie’s father has recently passed away as well) and making friends.

My favorite thing is that it’s written from the dragon’s point of view. Beginning each chapter is a word of “advice” to magical creatures about how to deal with their “pets”, but the narrative is from the point of view of a very old, somewhat cranky dragon. It’s a clever take. That, and it’s blissfully short. Yep and Ryder know their audience, get to the point, and don’t bother putting in a whole lot of backstory. There are clues here and there about Miss Drake’s former pets and Winnie’s family (I’d like to read more about them in other books!), but there are no long-winded passages, no extra words. It’s refreshing.

My  only complaint is that while there is a child character, the protagonist (and the one who propels the action, in the end) is the dragon. And that felt a little off. But other than that, it’s an enjoyable story.

(Just for the record: because this is a Cybils nominee, I’ve been asked to make sure y’all know this is my opinion only, and not that of the panel.)

Upside Down Magic

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upsidedownby Sarah Mynowski, Lauren Myracle, and Emily Jenkins
First sentence: “Nory Horace was trying to turn herself into a kitten.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Review copy pilfered off the ARC shelves at my place of employment.
Content: It’s simple enough for the younger set; probably good for advanced 2nd graders and up. It’s in the middle grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

Nory has a problem. She’s a witch, and she wants to get into the prestigious magic school that her super stuffy, absent father is head of. All she needs to do is turn into a kitten and hold that form for a few minutes. The problem is that she can’t do it. Well, she can turn into a kitten, but it never is just a kitten: it’s a beaver-kitten, or a dragon-kitten, or some other awful, terrible combination.

sOf course she doesn’t get into the school, and ends up going to a public magic school (the horror) and put in a class for those with “wonky” magic. There’s a kid who floats but can’t come down, another kid who turns into a rock, one who makes it rain inside and another one who is terrifying to animals. They are working to not only accept their magic as valid (in this society, those with wonky magic are Outcasts) and work together to make their magic do something incredible.

I think there’s a certain sort of kid who would love this kind of book. The kind of kid who likes magic stories, who likes an underdog story, and who doesn’t want to smack the adults in the book. I, unfortunately, am not that kid. I was annoyed at the predictable storyline and wanted to smack both the dad (the aunt who Nory ends up with is okay) and the mean girl at the new school. I understand I’m not the intended audience, so even though I didn’t care for it much, I realize that there are kids out there who will. And so I’m glad I read it for that reason.

(Just for the record: because this is a Cybils nominee, I’ve been asked to make sure y’all know this is my opinion only, and not that of the panel.)

The Wand & the Sea

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by Claire Caterer
First sentence: “Holly Shepard was unlike most twelve-year-olds in that she didn’t at all mid sharing a cramped cottage bedroom with her pudgy, snoring, laptop-loving younger brother.”
Support your local independent bookstore: buy it there!
Others in the series: The Key & the Flame
Review copy provided by the author’s publicist.
Content: It’s kind of slow to start, and the fantasy is more Narnia-esque than Harry Potter or Percy Jackson. Even so, there’s nothing content-wise, and if there’s a 9- or 10-year-old who likes Narnia, they’ll probably love this. It’s in the middle grade (grades 3-5) section of the bookstore.

It’s been a year since siblings Holly and Ben and their British friend Everett have been to the magical land of Anglielle, where Holly can do magic, and where they’re caught up in a good versus evil battle. They’re determined to get back, but this time, the portal they used before won’t work. This time, it’s the water element that’s highlighted. This time, they need to rescue their friends, who have been imprisoned by the king, and try and find the other adepts, who have been exiled from Anglielle.

Of course, it’s not a simple thing: Everett is still playing the role of the sulky somewhat traitor (think Edmund), the prince Avery’s loyalties are still in question. They do meet a group of pirates, on the ship the Sea Witch, that are quite fascinating. And when Holly finally confronts the Big Bad Guy, it’s pretty intense.

I went back and re-read my review/reaction to the first book in the series, and it seems I liked it. I had a less positive experience this time around; the first book didn’t stay with me as much, and it’s been a couple of years, and it took me longer to get into this story. Still, it’s channeling Narnia quite well, and in the end, the adventure was satisfying, while leaving room for another sequel. (I’m starting to suspect there will be four in all; one for each element.)

Not bad, overall.