Tag: Books

Book Review: The Boy Who Lost Fairyland

On By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, Reviews, Young Adult1 Comment

I have been waiting (and waiting…) for the fourth book in Catherynne Valente’s Fairyland series for over a year now–and it’s been my most anticipated book all that time.  So I am very happy to say that The Boy Who Lost Fairyland was delightful.  Not at all what I would have imagined for Fairyland 4!  But delightful.

I reread The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland in February, anticipating this one’s release, and that was a delight too.  The books in this series are packed so thick with wit and wisdom and whimsy that I knew I wasn’t taking it all in on a first read.  This is a rare book that was even better on a reread–and I also could be more patient waiting for some beloved supporting characters to turn up halfway through the book.

Patience may be a virtue needed for The Boy Who Lost Fairyland too.  Instead of returning to our heroine September and her dreadful plight from the last book, we instead find the story of Hawthorn, a troll abducted by the Red Wind and sent off as a changeling to the mysterious, mystical land of Chicago.  Although Hawthorne forgets his trollish past and believes himself to be Thomas, human boy, he’s still Not Normal, neither at home nor in the perilous realm of Public School 348.

Never fear, our charming narrator interrupts with an interlude after Chapter Two, to assure us that she knows we’re wondering about September, to beg patience and to invite us to “journey off the main road for a bit…[to] find a path through the snow to those little pockets of story which happen while the Hero is off doing other things.”  And how could I resist an invitation like that? Continue reading “Book Review: The Boy Who Lost Fairyland” →

Book Review: Unbound (Libriomancer Series)

On By cherylmahoneyIn Fantasy, ReviewsLeave a comment

Libriomancer by Jim C. Hines was one of the best books I read last year, the sequel continued strongly, and I’ve been eagerly awaiting the third book, Unbound.  Continuing the adventures of a magical librarian, the third book lived up to the first two–and the awesome potential of a series about a magical librarian!

The series centers on Isaac, a libriomancer born with the ability to reach into books and bring out objects described in the text.  I discussed the magic system in more depth in my review of the first book, so suffice to say here that it’s possibly the coolest thing ever, not the least because Hines and I seem to have read many of the same books.  Isaac frequently reaches inside books I recognize or love, which adds a whole other meta-level of awesome.

I’ll try to avoid too many spoilers for the first two books in the series, but some are unavoidable to discuss the plot of Unbound…  The third book opens with Isaac thrown out of the Porters, a 500-years-old organization defending the world from magic.  He’s reeling from recent magical destruction to his hometown, and from having his own magic locked away by Johannes Gutenberg (still very much alive, and the founder of the Porters).  Isaac channels his depression and grief into an obsession with finding his missing student, Jeneta, believed to be abducted by a mysterious magical being who plans to, well, conquer the world. Continue reading “Book Review: Unbound (Libriomancer Series)” →

Book Review: Sons from Afar (Tillerman Cycle)

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews, Young Adult2 Comments

I’m continuing my reread through Cynthia Voigt’s Tillerman Cycle with Book 5, Sons from Afar.  Books 1 and 2 focused on oldest sister Dicey, Books 3 and 5 spun out to focus on supporting characters, and Book 4 was a prequel.  This one finally brings us back into the heart of the Tillerman family, but shifts focus (as the title suggests) onto Dicey’s two brothers.

Six years have passed since Book 2.  James is sixteen and Sammy is twelve, both struggling with identity, how they fit in (or don’t) and where they’re going in life.  James latches onto the idea that he can learn about himself by learning about his father, who left the family before Sammy was even born.  James drags Sammy along on a quest (mostly metaphorical, but there’s some travel) trying to find answers about what kind of man their father was.

This is another book that’s more about character than it is about plot.  The search for information gives it some thread of focus, but mostly it’s about the character of the two boys.  Trying to find out about their father is, not very subtly, really about finding themselves, and I think James at least even knows that. Continue reading “Book Review: Sons from Afar (Tillerman Cycle)” →

Blog Hop: Judging a Book By Its…Title

On By cherylmahoneyIn Blog Hop4 Comments

book blogger hopThis week’s Book Blogger Hop question: Do you think a book’s title is important?

A book’s title is possibly THE important thing for me.  I pick up some books by way of word of mouth, and in that case it will usually be a friend telling me something about the story (and why I should love it). And I read a fair number of books because I’ve read the author before and want to see what else they’ve written.

But a lot of the books I read?  Either I click on a book review, or I pull a book off a shelf.  And in either case, whether it’s a post title or the spine of the book, the first thing I have to go on is the title.

The funny thing is, with a few exceptions (The True Meaning of Smekday or The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland come to mind), the title doesn’t stay all that important to me.  I wouldn’t say that I particularly love the titles of most of the books I particularly love.  But there has to be something about the title that caught my eye to begin with!

Do titles make a big difference in what you read?  Or do you find books in a way (word of mouth, for example) that makes the title less important?

The Martian by Andy Weir

On By cherylmahoneyIn Reviews, Science Fiction2 Comments

Digging through my pile of exciting books, one of the first I finished was The Martian by Andy Weir.  It was a good read–not as exciting as I hoped–but I can see how it could be a really great read…for someone else.  Someone with a bit more interest in science than I have!

Set in the near-future, the title character is Mark Watney, an American astronaut left behind on Mars when his team has to make an emergency evacuation.  The rest of the crew believes he’s already dead–but Watney survives, and now faces the challenge of surviving alone on Mars until the next schedules mission…four years away.  Luckily, most of the supplies for the mission were left behind, but it’s still a struggle for food, water and air.  Meanwhile on Earth, satellite images soon alert NASA to the mistake made, and the whole planet rallies around how to rescue the stranded astronaut.

In a lot of ways, this book reminds me of Hatchet, essentially the story of a castaway surviving alone.  That comparison feels like a helpful framework for addressing what I did and didn’t like about this book. Continue reading “The Martian by Andy Weir” →